Ghost Tweeters

Ghost Twittering is fast becoming the Net’s new big profession. Those tweets from major celebs like Britney, 50 Cent and Kanye West? Those 140-character messages may look like the real deal, but there’s a good chance someone is tweeting under their names.

According to The New York Times, Twitter has become such an important tool for celebs to reach out to fans as well as companies bonding with customers that tweeting can often amount to a full-time job in itself.

For example, 50 Cent doesn’t use Twitter. However, the rapper does have Chris Romero, AKA Broadway, the director of 50 Cent’s online empire. When 50 Cent fans receive tweets from their hero, those brief messages are coming from Romero, who often lifts past quotes from his boss to send to Twitter space.

“He doesn’t actually use Twitter,” Romero said, referring to 50 Cent. “But the energy of it is all him.”

Britney Spears is another celeb who’d rather let someone else Twitter for her. In Brit’s case that someone is often Lauren Kozak, social-media director of BritneySpears.com, or Adam Leber, who signs Brit’s tweets as “manager.” However, Britney herself still sends a few tweets now and then.

But not all celebs hire others to Twitter in their names. Lance Armstrong tweeted about breaking his collarbone only hours after the accident happened, and Milwaukee Bucks forward Charlie Villanueva tweeted at halftime from the locker room.

So you never know who’s actually composing and sending all those tweets. What’s more, many people are falsely tweeting under various famous names. MSNBC “Countdown” host, Keith Olbermann recently commented about the thousands of people receiving tweets bearing his name, telling his audience, “I’m not even on Twitter.”

But if you see a tweet from basketball star Shaquille O’Neal, chances are it’s coming from the one-and-only Shaq. Or maybe we would say “Real Shaq,” which is how he signs his tweets. Seems Shaq loves sending tweets containing personal news or even trash-talk about his opponents. Furthermore, O’Neal has a definite opinion about ghost Twittering.

“It’s 140 characters. It’s so few characters,” O’Neal said. “If you need a ghostwriter for that, I feel sorry for you.”

To read The New York Times article, click here.