Gawker Stalker

[Avant Garde]

Do you think its okay for celebs to be followed like this, or is does it cross the line?

http://www.gawker.com/stalker/

 

[lemeray]

As long as he doesn't touch them or abuse them. If it's just for goss, I think its okay. He is practically the same as a pap.

 

[Deleted member 49693]

It looks okay. It looks to be more like celeb spotting than stalking...

 

[aquamis]

It looks okay. It looks to be more like celeb spotting than stalking...

Agree. It's always been really harmless stuff. Someone spots a star, writes in and says a bit about what they were wearing etc. No different to what heaps of other websites do, and not nearly as intrusive as the paparrazzi.

 

[oanadobre]

It's a risky road. Innocent "spotting" can transform into obsessive stalking...

 

[Whitelinen]

^Agree. I think people should be left alone.

 

[Avant Garde]

Clooney Takes Aim at 'Gawker Stalker' Site
[SIZE=-1]Friday March 31 4:47 PM ET[/SIZE]

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George Clooney is known as a prankster, but his plan to undermine a Web site that posts celebrity sightings is no joke, his publicist said Friday.
Clooney has suggested swamping Gawker.com's "Gawker Stalker" feature with false notes about stars' whereabouts, spokesman Stan Rosenfield said.

In an e-mail Rosenfield recently distributed on Clooney's behalf to other high-powered publicists, the actor calls for publicity firms and their clients to join the effort against the site that some have called a threat to celebrities.

"There is a simple way to render these guys useless," Clooney said in the message. "Flood their Web site with bogus sightings. Get your clients to get 10 friends to text in fake sightings of any number of stars.

"A couple hundred conflicting sightings and this Web site is worthless. No need to try to create new laws to restrict free speech. Just make them useless. That's the fun of it. And then sit back and enjoy the ride," Clooney writes, signing the note, "Thanks, George."

Rosenfield said he did not know how the e-mail, which was intended as private, was publicly released and reported on Friday by the New York Post.
Clooney's campaign may be bearing fruit. Rosenfield said he heard from two publicists whose clients were said by Gawker Stalker to have been spotted in New York when the stars were actually abroad.

Clooney, who received a best-supporting actor Oscar for "Syriana" last month, has weighed in before on celebrity privacy. Although an outspoken defender of the first amendment, he's criticized tabloids and the paparazzi that shoot for them as sometimes going over the line.

Gawker, a popular site, had been posting map-free "Stalker" sightings for two years. Now it pinpoints the locations of readers' random celebrity sightings on the Internet, using a Google map of Manhattan.

Publicists say the new feature puts their clients in harm's way by revealing their specific whereabouts.

"Not at all," the site's editor, Jessica Coen, told The Associated Press last week. "Our spies are just regular people ... people that are excited to see someone they like. Our readers are, for the most part, a very educated, well-meaning bunch."

Rosenfield rebuts the idea of the site as a harmless diversion.

For those who would argue that, he said Friday, "I have two words: Rebecca Schaeffer."
He was referring to the 21-year-old star of TV's "My Sister Sam" who was shot to death in 1989 at her Los Angeles home by an obsessed fan, who was sentenced to life in prison.

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yahoo news

 

[silk skin paws]

This is making the news thus giving gawker stalker more hits.

 

[eternitygoddess]

I think it's freaky that no matter where you go, people are watching your every move and judging you by it.

 

[laurlaur]

I think it's creepy and potentially dangerous. If a someone wanted to do harm to a celebrity and saw where they were, they would be able to. People have been killed in the past.

 

[oolie coco]

I don't like it either. Like laurlaur said, celebrity attracts the psychotic. Look at the Jodie Foster, John Lennon, Gianni Versace incidents...

 

[ShesElectric]

Jodie Foster, John Lennon, Gianni Versace

details!

 

[SiennaInLondon]

^ Err the latter two were brutally shot dead and the first had to deal with the president of the US being shot 'for' her

 

[VainJane]

Isn't this the same thing that gossip magazines do all the time?

They always post articles about 'sightings' of stars, be it at the grocery store or some bar.


Anyway, I feel bad for movie stars...stalkers seem really, really scary...

......although as of late I can't stand George Clooney, so I kinda hope this site continues to piss him off

 

[laurlaur]

^Well this one does it in real time. So Mary-Kate at a Starbucks (with the exact address given) 10 minutes ago is different than her at the same place last Wednesday.