Morten Lund and Gawker - Stalker WTF

Can we use that service to track Matt Cutts at SE events? We could like snap pics of him with our phone, email them to a website that automatically posts the attached photos. Then we could like use our treo's to surf to the site to see in real time where he's at. If we could do that, this would be cool.

Otherwise it's just creepy and wrong. People are people even if they're famous - and should have some expectation of being able to go out and have a beer with friends or whatever.

I don't watch much TV, but I was in a hotel room a week or so ago, and this story was all over the news.

They are good at getting traditional media coverage, and when their biz model is primarily CPM based I guess that is probably one of the most important things they can do.

People are people even if they're famous - and should have some expectation of being able to go out and have a beer with friends or whatever.

There is an entire (very popular) magazine row dedicated exclusively to ensuring that no one who is famous has any privacy at all.

Just because you're an ugly blogger, if you're famous, don't expect any different! (not saying it's right)

I don't understand why it's a big deal all of a sudden. They've been running Gawker Stalker for awhile. They just recently added the map though, and it's not as delayed as it used to be, but it's still not in real time. and also I've read several places that most of the sightings are made up.

"People are people even if they're famous "

I agree with that for people who are accidentally famous. But most of these celebrities have put alot of intentional effort into being internationally recognized - which leads to more sales for their movie/cd/etc. It's naive to think you can become famous to make more money, but then hide from that fame when it's more convienient for you. If they value their privacy, they should think about that before doing a magazine shoot, a newspaper interview, go on TRL, get a video on MTV, act in a nation-wide film, etc. You can't do all these things to get people interested in you, and then expect to be able to turn it off like a lightswitch.

I've gotta agree with Morton that Gawker Stalker is "ugly, ugly, ugly", but then, you could use the same set of adjectives to describe most of the celebrity-worship culture that media and entertainment businesses across the globe have been promoting for decades.

Personally, I'd never bother a celebrity for an autograph or a photo. As wheel notes, they're just people after all, so leave them the fuck alone. Plus, most of them are extraordinarily tiny when you meet them in person, which ruins the fun the next time you see them in an action movie - "Wait, you mean that munchkin is the one taking over this fortress?? WTF is that??!!?" It puts too much of a strain on suspension of disbelief.

However, to thejack's point, the reason they're being hounded is that they've deliberately put themselves in the public eye, often due to their own great efforts exerted over years if not decades. They WANTED to be rich and famous. And their success is predicated on celebrity.

So now that celeb A has achieved his goal, he gets to tell the normal people who made him rich and famous by paying money to see him that they shouldn't be excited to see him in person? That's just dumb.

If you're so averse to public recognition, work a minimum wage job. No one will ever even aknowledge your existence.

Finally, to Aaron's point, regardless of whether this is a scummy little scam that Denton's pulling (and it is), this kind of controversy is driving Gawker's page views through the roof.

I call envy - would have written BS but that's not nice to Dave or Morten...

This is innovative, it's a fun service, it's popular, it's newsworthy, it creates buzz, content, traffic - it's plainly a good idea...

All the kids love it and it earns money too, what's wrong with that now?