Andy Warhol once said “every person will be world-famous for fifteen minutes”. This phrase was truly prophetic. Some 20 years before The Real World, and 30 years before Survivor and Fear Factor, well before we ever heard of Darva Conger, Regis Philbin or Simon Cowell, this eccentric artist predicted it all.
I heard on Bob and Tom this morning about a guy who jumped from a plane at 30,000 feet in a special suit so he could glide across the English Channel. The BBC says that it took 14 minutes. SkyNews says that it took 6. CNN says that it took slightly more than six. At least they agree that it was the English Channel.
Another guy is so proud of his pain threshold that he is planning to get tattooed for 40 hours straight in order to break a record. They didn’t ask me, but if I have 500 hornets stinging me at the same time (his quote), I’m going to run in the other direction!
Now, it seems we will do most anything to have our own 15 minutes. What will you eat, what will you wear, how far will you push yourself, who will you marry, what will you do for a free t-shirt? The list goes on and on. Heck, there’s even a web site that asks about the most talked-about events of the moment.
Alas, even Mr. Warhol apparently tired of his famous quote by 1979, changing it to “In fifteen minutes everybody will be famous.” Anyone know where I can find out something about these things called “blogs“?