Last week, I received three near identical tweets from three different people. The only difference between them was that they purported to come from different famous people
Then when you looked marginally further, you found the disclaimer. Here’s one which caught my attention.
@BrunoMarsWorId follows you. My Tweets are here to inspire. I am not Bruno Mars. *Parody Account* This account is not associated with Bruno Mars. *I do not own any content posted*
Looks like the Not Bruno Mars tweeter and those of similar ilk had gone in for some legal-sounding words of denial, lest someone dumps on them. [My own tame legal eagle says they ain’t worth a row of beans. Just saying.]
Who is Bruno Mars
My first question. It seems Bruno Mars writes and sings and has a global reach, even if he hasn’t quite got to downtown Woodford yet. Must check my understanding of that with Conor. The Bruno dude has 25 million followers on twitter.
The world of parody accounts
I had come across the world of the parody accounts, messages from not very famous people passing themselves off as more famous people. The idea is nearly as old as art itself.
A little searching, and I found quite a few other mock Bruno Mars tweeters. One said he or she had just completed one for his or her Spanish Class. That’s one creative Spanish teacher out there. Gracias.
Pedagogy is built on the shores of grateful imitation. Maybe for my next leadership Gig I will ask for examples of worthwhile leadership blogs: Julius Caesar, Adolf Schiklgruber, the dog in the Vitality ad, (but not Jose Mourinho, too much legal hassle over image rights; nor Donald Trump, the market is too polluted already).
Whatever. Anyway, back to the mock or parody accounts
My spoof BM has 96 thousand followers and has followed back 77 thousand, in some 36000 tweets. Of course, this productivity has to compromise on content, if the 14 tweets sent me in this last hour are representative.
Is this a promising business model? It is based on imitation, as its form implies. In my beloved Business School jargon, there is a dangerously low entry barrier for anyone who wants to get into the market.
That’s no reason to diss or dismiss it. I won’t be following back myself for two reasons. I don’t want upward of a hundred tweets a day (if that’s the way Twitter works). And the ones I received did not add much to my sense of well-being.
The sincerest kind of flattery
As the great Bruno Wilde put it, imitation is the sincerest form of parody that mediocrity can bestow on the great.
Much of art is homage. Respectful imitation. Then there is gleeful parody, and gainful but creative mischief (Van Meegeren’s work passed off as Vermeer’s comes to mind).
Some spoof tweeters are very funny indeed, and add to the richness of Twitter. Some celebs seem particularly suited as targets. A natural pomposity always helps in that respect, I thought, as I looked though a list of best parody blogs.
The Telegraph wrote about the general idea of a spoof account.
I recently found enjoyment from reading about Staunton, the great 18th chess figure. The parody account tweeter was humorous, his image was that of the tombstone of Howard Staunton.
Disclaimer
My Tweets are here to inspire. I am the editor of Leaders We Deserve. This is not a *Parody Account* and *As far as I am aware, I own the content posted herein*