The example that I am going to talk about is the online spokesperson
of Lancome -- Michelle Phan.
She is a famous YouTube blogger. Here are some basic information about her.
She has a screenname called RiceBunny. She joined YouTube in 18th July 2006.
Her subscribers in Youtube had already over 1million. Her videos had viewed by people
over 2 hundreds of million times. The above statistics can show how popular she is.
She was born in Massachusetts and she is Vietnamese American.
She started her artisitic training when she was 12-year-old. She taught herself how to
paint so we can say that Michelle is a self taught painter for over 10years.
Originally, she decided to cater to her mother request for being a dermatologist at Tampa
Bay Technical High School. But then she convinced her mother to let her major in
illustration at Ringling College of Art and Design.
So, before she became famous she was just a student and worked as a part-time
waiteress in a sushi restaurant.
How Michelle build her fame?
She is known for her high quality makeup tutorial videos. Her video style is much
more technical when compared to others. Her videos incorporate her voice over
instruction and with music and text subtitles.
Videos like "Lady Gaga Poker Face Tutorial" and "Bad Romance Look".etc are
popular among the internet.
Now, Michelle is a public image over the world.
In November of 2010, she became "the No.1 most subscribed female on YouTube and
the first female to reach 1million subscribers". Untill now, she had created 100 videos
on YouTube. She also created a skin care brand called IQQU which is an online
shop. Amazingly, Lancome saw some of her videos with using their brand products.
Then signed her as the official video makeup artist and spokesperson in Feburary of 2010.
After being famous, Michelle still keep doing the similar things as usual --- Providing
makeup tutorial clips. At the same time, she use her fame to help the weak.
For example, she posted a video to arouse people awareness of Malaria and appeal
people to donate money.
(reference link:
http://www.youtube.com/user/michellephan?blend=1&ob=4#p/u/6/UpnmC3BbvEg)
She taught viewers how to live green to save the Earth.
(reference link:
http://www.youtube.com/user/michellephan?blend=1&ob=4#p/u/3/rDgd4gR9ZfM)
In September 2008, she helped organize a charity fashion show called "Fashion for
Compassion" to help the victim of a Tampa sexual assault case.
To sum up, we can see how her life has changed because of the platform of YouTube.
It allows her to show her skill and develop her professional image.
Before, she was just a normal girl like you and me. And now she has her own business
and influence in society. She constructed her own identity successfully through Youtube.
The most special point is that she is not the only one who influenced by her online identity.
But also others people. She use her fame to help others and change their life.
Even her makeup videos, they are influencing every girl who watched her clips.
As she said, she "wants to help women empower themselves with makeup". She believe
makeup can transform women's life even with one lipstick.
So, in this example we can see how a girl change her life and others' through her
online identity. Her online identity and real identity has mix together and this is what
we called online covergency.
Conclusion of our group:
The boundary between reality and virtual reality are unclear nowdays.
When we started using our online identity, most people may think that there is
no interaction with our reality. But is it really true?
Through the examples from our group, we can find that what we did through the online
identity actually have some direct or indirect influence to our reality.
Michelle and Jayesslee show their talent via their online identity and finally make
their dream come true. They become popular public images. Even online identity itself
are interrelated with each other. Mia gives her real heart to make friends with a friend
online. However she finally disappointed by her disappearence. Making she feels sad.
We can see the influence of our online identity are not only in the virtual but also in our
reality. Those happiness and unhappiness we recieved are real and undenialble.
____________________________________________________________
Reference links:
- photos reference link:
http://www.google.com.hk/images?hl=zh-TW&biw=1362&bih=584&q=MICHELLE+PHAN&rlz=1R2SUNC_enHK359&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&ei=SkzhTOiRG4GucK2uqZkM&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=6&ved=0CFkQsAQwBQ
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelle_Phan
- http://www.vanityfair.com/online/beauty/2010/05/its-a-bad-pun-thats.html
- http://www.youtube.com/user/MichellePhan?feature=chclk
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