| Contents > Big Fish/Little Fish: Perceptions of Celebrity by Joyleen Christensen |
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Although this elaborate scientific construction is obviously intended to be farcical in nature, it does, nevertheless, provide an extremely useful method for easily communicating the relative social ranking of disparate individuals.
Through the use of three simple tables that impose an artificial class register of celebrities, I propose to demonstrate how we may position individuals within a global context without losing sight of their native celebrity status. Each of these tables is a sample representation of the public social ranking of a number of celebrities who have been divided into various fame classifications according to Schulman’s logarithmic equation. Taking each individual’s Google ‘hit’ rating as it was on 23 February 2007, I have applied the logarithmic function in Table 1 using Monica Lewinsky’s ‘hit’ count of 1,260,000 as the ‘standard for fame comparison’.
Table 1: Classified Celebrities
| Name | Hits | Fame | List |
| Britney Spears | 34,100,000 | 14.32 | A |
| Bill Gates | 32,700,000 | 14.14 | |
| The Beatles | 17,200,000 | 11.35 | |
| Jesus Christ | 13,800,000 | 10.39 | |
| Bill Clinton | 12,400,000 | 9.93 | |
| Albert Einstein | 12,200,000 | 9.86 | |
| Brad Pitt | 4,850,000 | 5.85 | |
| David Beckham | 4,060,000 | 5.08 | |
| Tiger Woods | 3,110,000 | 3.92 | B |
| Kylie Minogue | 3,050,000 | 3.84 | |
| Nicole Kidman | 2,140,000 | 2.30 | |
| Cate Blanchett | 1,810,000 | 1.57 | |
| Jackie Chan | 1,660,000 | 1.19 | |
| Jet Li | 1,620,000 | 1.09 | |
| Russell Crowe | 1,540,000 | 0.87 | |
| John Howard | 1,510,000 | 0.78 | |
| Heath Ledger | 1,410,000 | 0.49 | |
| Andy Lau | 1,380,000 | 0.39 | |
| Monica Lewinsky | 1,260,000 | 0 | |
| The Wiggles | 1,180,000 | -0.28 | |
| Chow Yun-Fat | 1,150,000 | -0.39 | |
| Shane Warne | 897,000 | -1.47 | |
| Ian Thorpe | 798,000 | -1.98 | |
| Stephen Chow | 741,000 | -2.30 | |
| Leslie Cheung | 682,000 | -2.67 | |
| Jacky Cheung | 483,000 | -4.16 | |
| Nicholas Tse | 388,000 | -5.11 | C |
| Aaron Kwok | 365,000 | -5.38 | |
| Leon Lai | 334,000 | -5.77 | |
| Eric Tsang | 302,000 | -6.20 | |
| Francis Ng | 239,000 | -7.22 | |
| Cathy Freeman | 237,000 | -7.26 | |
| Eason Chan | 233,000 | -7.33 | |
| Tim Winton | 164,000 | -8.85 | |
| Lau Ching-wan | 135,000 | -9.70 | |
| Nick Cheung | 108,000 | -10.67 | |
| Eddie Maguire | 74,200 | -12.30 | |
| Bert Newton | 63,900 | -12.60 | |
| Eric Kot | 53,500 | -13.72 | |
| Gretel Killeen | 46,900 | -14.29 | |
| Nicky Wu | 40,500 | -14.93 | |
| Daryl Somers | 34,600 | -15.61 | D |
| Teddy Robin Kwan | 16,500 | -18.83 | |
| Ray Meagher | 16,000 | -18.96 | |
| Matthew Krok | 4,200 | -37.93 | F |
| ME!!! | 24 | -47.20 | G |
Table 2 catalogues the Australian figures recorded in Table 1 and makes necessary adjustments (taking Eddie Maguire as the ‘Australian standard for fame comparison’) to give a more accurate depiction of the Australian celebrity hierarchy.
Table 2: Classified Australian Celebrities
| Name | Hits | Fame | List |
| Kylie Minogue | 3,050,000 | 16.14 | A |
| Nicole Kidman | 2,140,000 | 14.60 | |
| Cate Blanchett | 1,810,000 | 13.87 | |
| Russell Crowe | 1,540,000 | 13.17 | |
| John Howard | 1,510,000 | 13.08 | |
| Heath Ledger | 1,410,000 | 12.79 | |
| The Wiggles | 1,180,000 | 12.01 | |
| Shane Warne | 897,000 | 10.82 | |
| Ian Thorpe | 798,000 | 10.31 | |
| Cathy Freeman | 237,000 | 5.04 | |
| Tim Winton | 164,000 | 3.44 | B |
| Eddie Maguire | 74,200 | 0 | |
| Bert Newton | 63,900 | -0.65 | |
| Gretel Killeen | 46,900 | -1.99 | |
| Daryl Somers | 34,600 | -3.31 | |
| Ray Meagher | 16,000 | -6.66 | C |
| Matthew Krok* | 4,200 | -12.47 | |
| ‘The Kid from Hey Dad’* | 203 | -25.63 | D |
* Interestingly, if we were to substitute the generic title ‘The Kid from Hey Dad’ for the name ‘Matthew Krok’ we would have a hit count of 203 (fame = -25.63) – placing the same individual in both the ‘C’ and ‘D’ List Celebrity categories!
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| Contents > Big Fish/Little Fish: Perceptions of Celebrity by Joyleen Christensen |