Oversharing and social media II: Like Animals

It is incredible to see that in only four years this grumpy cat became as famous as human celebrities but what surprises me the most is people following the grumpy cat next adventures on iPhone an iPad apps.

Oversharing is not only about selfie or private posts. Indeed, more and more persons owning social accounts had been starting to share pictures of animals, mostly pets. As a matter of fact, it is interesting to see what kind of animals are getting popular thanks to internet users.

Last December, the American television and radio network CBS news posted a list of the most followed animals on social media; one of most popular is The Official Grumpy Cat.

As explained on their website, the grumpy cat movement started after a photo of a cat doing an award face expression was posted on the entertainment, social networking, and news website Reddit in 2012 and went viral. Few more informations such as the cat breed, age, preferred alimentation are also mentioned. As shown on this screenshot taken from the Official Grumpy Cat website, a merchandising site had been set up with cat toys, books and so forth.

It is incredible to see that in only four years this grumpy cat became as famous as human celebrities but what surprises me the most is people following the grumpy cat next adventures on iPhone an iPad apps. Images of the grumpy cat are being used to make fun of politics such as the American president Barack Obama  during his speech at the Democratic Women’s Leadership Forum in Washington on 24th October.

Grumpy cat has also conquered sport games such as baseball by making an appearance and participating to a photo shooting with the Arizona Diamondbacks Chief Baseball Officer Tony La Russa on 8th September.

To conclude, we can say there is a real atmosphere built around the Official Grumpy Cat. Social media accounts, pictures often updated on a weekly basis – sometimes daily – iPhone and iPad applications, mobile games… there is a real merchandising existing for few years around animals. This new trend had been increased by the active use of social media by animal lovers and their involvement is sometimes much stronger for animals than for their peers.