Internet Time Machine

We Are All Famous Now

Are you an A-Lister or a Z-Lister?

This story is part of the Internet Time Machine, a collection about life online in the 2010s.

My husband takes me to see the documentary Author, and I become obsessed with the story of JT LeRoy, the literary phenomenon who was unmasked as a fictional figure created by the writer Laura Albert. Albert’s story is harrowing, perplexing, and wholly absorbing. The film asks more questions of its audience than it answers: What is fame? What do we want from writers? What is it about a spotlight that simultaneously withdraws and repels us? What do we do when we want everyone to see us, and no one to look at us?

A few days earlier, I attend a launch event for press and influencers. I’m early, and I don’t know many of the other guests. I talk to a woman who introduces herself as a blogger and says her name as if she expects me to light up. “Aha! Wow, it’s you!” I try to make the right face, but it’s too late. In conversation, I mention a friend who has written a book that I’m very excited about. “She’s a huge talent,” I say, and, “I think this book is going to change things for the better. I’m so excited.” The blogger’s face turns in half a second, like a sky switched to gray on a sultry summer’s day. She’s upset about young women, pretty women…