Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI SCROLL: Wayback Machine hacked, Elvira vs. Ariana Grande + Wicked fan edit poster recap

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MINI SCROLL: Wayback Machine hacked, Elvira vs. Ariana Grande + Wicked fan edit poster recap · Mini Scroll

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  Hi everyone, welcome to Mini Scroll, the daily Internet
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  culture podcast bringing you the biggest stories from social
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  media, the creator economy and the digital space every Monday
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  through Thursday. I'm your host, Lauren Meisner,
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  the founder of the youth digital media brand Centennial World.
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  Welcome back to Mini Scroll, everyone.
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  Happy Tuesday. So before I get into the stories
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  for today, I wanted to remind you guys that tomorrow there
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  will be an episode, but instead of Mini Scroll, it will be my
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  interview with Heather and Whitney from The Real Housewives
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  of Salt Lake City. And I know we have a lot of
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  Bravo fans that listen to this podcast, but I also know we have
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  a lot of non Bravo fans. But I think it's still an
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  interview. If you guys even like, even if
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  you don't watch Bravo and you don't care about housewives,
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  it's still a really interesting one because I tried to keep it
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  very Internet culture focused. Like, we talked a lot about
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  having a chronically online fan base and how that impacts their
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  experience on the show in real life as like reality TV
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  celebrities. So I hope you guys will get
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  something from it. It was a wild, wild interview.
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  As I said last week, they were so energetic and fun and just
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  like, silly the whole time. But I think it was OK.
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  All right, let's just get into the stories for today.
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  So the first story that I have for you guys is a bit of tech
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  news. Internet Archive is under siege
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  by hackers, So the Intranet Archive is the largest preserver
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  of intranet activity worldwide. It's run by a nonprofit
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  organization based in San Francisco, and it's responsible
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  for the popular Wayback Machine, which launched in 1996.
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  Last week, the nonprofit was attacked by hackers, where they
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  leaked information of millions of users and quote defaced it
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  with a message taunting the nonprofit's website for running
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  on a shoestring budget, according to the Washington
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  Post. That is just so mean, just like
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  so petty and savage. The attack has impacted over 900
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  billion with AB pages archived by Internet Archive on the
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  Wayback Machine. Now to prevent further leaks,
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  Internet Archive has taken the Wayback Machine offline for the
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  past week, which is the longest it has been down in 30 years.
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  This has caused a lot of discussion about the importance
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  of archiving online history, especially given how fast-paced
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  everything is. And we talked a bit about this
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  on the Myspace episode on a my Myspace deep dive that we did, I
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  don't know, a few months ago, you know, you can't find old
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  Myspace profiles because they were, there was like some server
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  glitch and they were basically just like wiped clean.
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  So, you know, profiles, I think it was up until like 2014 are
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  just gone with all the photos and all the information, all the
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  data. And the same can be said for so
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  many things. Like even as like a digital
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  media journalist articles that I wrote, I don't know, sometimes
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  even like five years ago, as early as five years ago, you
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  can't find them anymore. Like no matter how hard you put
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  like my name together with all the different keywords with the
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  publication title, you cannot find this.
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  There is such a common misconception that the Internet
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  is forever. And I think, you know, it makes
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  sense. It felt like forever.
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  It felt like having this big digital footprint and would
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  follow us forever when we were younger.
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  And like, you know, our parents just had to say that because you
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  want to be careful what you post on the Internet like that still
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  rings true. But our digital footprint, at
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  least from, you know, the 2000s, twenty 10s, it's not as
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  preserved, I think as a lot of us thought it would be.
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  And Internet Archive is one of the ways or one of the tools
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  that, you know, has been actually preserving that.
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  And it's so important to preserve our Internet history.
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  Like, it's crazy to think that given how fast-paced everything
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  is and the rate of change in technology, like the fact that
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  we are just losing decades of information all the time, like
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  genuinely all the time. There is so much important work
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  that this nonprofit organization is doing.
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  For example, the Wayback Machine is often present in evidence in
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  court cases when that kind of evidence has been erased.
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  So, you know, it is doing like good important work.
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  This organization and they said in this Washington Post article,
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  they have no idea why the hackers did it.
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  It's very likely they just did it to say that they did it.
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  So I guess they'll be investing more heavily in cybersecurity
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  moving forward because they they did say also in this article
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  that they haven't been. Yes, very scary.
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  And I think the Wayback Machine as of like today is back up, but
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  other elements of Internet Archive are still down.
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  All right, the next story that I have is that Ariana Grande has
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  apologized for being the worst celebrity encounter ever named
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  by Elvira. So a clip went viral over the
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  past probably about 24 hours of spooky entertainer Elvira naming
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  Ariana Grande as her worst celebrity encounter.
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  Runs with Periana Mandy. OK, she came and she brought 20
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  guests. She she wanted 2021 tickets.
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  We're like OK and we give her the tickets and she comes
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  backstage and she asked if I could take pictures with all of
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  her friends and relatives she brought.
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  I take a picture with every single one of them.
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  I sign autographs for every single one of them.
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  Then I say to her, can we take a photo together?
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  And she goes Nah, I don't realize their thoughts.
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  I mean, come on. OK.
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  Alvira posted screenshots of an article talking about this to
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  her Instagram, which is kind of crazy, and that prompted Ariana
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  to respond. So Ariana wrote.
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  I'm so disheartened to see this. I actually don't even remember
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  getting the chance to meet you because I had an anxiety attack
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  into my memory left before the rest of my family.
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  This was around seven years ago and at the time I was really not
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  great with being in public crowds or loud places.
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  But if I'm remembering this moment, I sincerely apologize
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  for offending you. Thank you for being so nice to
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  my mom. She told me how lovely you were.
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  She might have had different feelings about that now, but
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  I'll talk to her clearly. We all have our days.
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  Sending love always. You'll always be our queen of
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  Halloween. OK, so I actually just wanted to
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  mention this because I feel like when celebrities call each other
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  out and like I Alvira to Ariana Grande is a very big leap.
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  They're very different scale of celebrity, but still when you
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  know, they still got it was she's famous enough that it got
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  picked up. You know, I think when
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  celebrities call each other out, I think it's just kind of savage
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  or even sometimes I find when like tik tokers make videos
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  about meeting different celebrities in public and stuff,
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  I just don't think that's necessarily appropriate.
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  I don't know. I think, OK, it's one thing if
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  like a celebrity has a really bad experience with Ariana
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  Grande and they tell people in their lives and then it kind of
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  moves around the industry and then Ariana Grande has a
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  reputation in the industry for being difficult or not very nice
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  or whatever. I think, sure, that's fair game.
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  You can talk about it within the industry, within your private
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  life, with people that you know, even if there were colleagues
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  like you can share that information.
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  I think bringing it to the fans, we have no idea what it feels
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  like to be famous and we have no idea what someone might be going
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  through in any given moment. And I think we often are kind of
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  waiting for people to trip up. I think it's like this kind of,
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  it feels like validating or it's like confirmation to us that
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  like these people that have it all, well, they have it all, but
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  like they're assholes. So I think we can as like we as
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  the fans, as the public who don't understand the context of
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  that interaction and what it feels like to be that celebrity,
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  what they could have been going through in that moment,
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  whatever. Like it just leads to bullying.
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  I don't know if that's really the right word, but like just so
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  much like hate directed towards that celebrity.
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  And I just don't think that's fair.
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  I'm surprised that she posted this, that she shared this about
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  Ari. Like, I think it's just kind of
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  shitty. I think it's like I said, fine
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  to do it within your circle, even within the industry, but
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  bringing it to the fans is like taking it to another level.
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  Like it's like to me, it's a step too far.
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  OK. Speaking of Ari, I did want to
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  touch on the Wicked poster being changed.
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  I feel like it is one of the most viral things going on on
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  TikTok right now and we could not avoid it.
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  So a fan on TikTok edited the Wicked poster of Cynthia Rivo
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  and Ariana Grande to look more like the original Playbill.
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  But in doing so they basically covered Cynthia's entire face.
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  So Cynthia saw this and she posted on her Instagram story.
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  She like put a screenshot of it and then she wrote.
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  This is the wildest most offensive thing I have seen.
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  Equal to that awful AI of us fighting.
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  Equal to people posing the question is your pussy green?
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  People have been commenting that on the poster.
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  So like Ariana Grande is whispering.
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  It's like the wicked poster, right?
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  So Ari is whispering to Cynthia and people have been commenting
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  like, is your pussy green? As in, like, that's what Ari is
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  asking Cynthia Revo. So she said.
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  None of this is funny. None of it is cute.
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  It degrades me. It degrades us.
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  The original poster is an illustration.
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  I'm a real life human being who chose to look right down the
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  barrel of the camera to you, the viewer, Because without words,
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  we communicate with our eyes. Our poster is an homage, not an
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  imitation. To edit my face and hide my eyes
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  is to erase me, and that is just deeply hurtful.
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  OK, so there are a lot of mixed opinions on this reaction to the
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  fan edit, but I did want to come at this from the perspective of
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  the celebrity. I think no matter how you feel
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  about Cynthia or this particular situation, I do think we rarely
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  consider how the fan object feels about the concept of fan
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  edits in general. And in this story, she mentions
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  several different like, fan edits and interactions and like
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  ways that fans are, they're engaging with Wicked and like,
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  inside jokes that the fandom is already creating about Wicked,
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  Like she mentions those in this story.
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  So this is obviously something that she has been dealing with.
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  Like she's been, I'm going to assume, struggles, maybe not the
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  right word, but I was going to say like struggling with like
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  the level of fan interaction and fan engagement with Wicked.
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  And Ariana Grande is probably very used to this by now because
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  this is just her reality and it has been for like a decade.
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  But for Cynthia, this might be be a little bit more new.
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  I think usually fan edits are pretty harmless.
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  And I'm sure some celebrities do love seeing like compilations of
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  their performances and you know, things like that.
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  But there are a lot of like really messed up fan edits.
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  And I'm not saying that this is a messed up fan edit.
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  Again, if this is not necessarily about this
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  particular situation, I just think sometimes we need to like
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  zoom out and see the context in which someone is reacting right.
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  So when you think about like some of the fan edits that we
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  see guys like we see like yasified celebrities all the
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  time, like Leighton Meester, Blake Lively, I don't know, just
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  like all of these celebrities constantly Jessica Alba and it's
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  like the original photo and they will just like perfect 365 it
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  and they have like so much more makeup on.
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  They change their hair color, they change their skin tone.
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  Sometimes we'll see songs that are created using a singer's
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  voice with AI, which I can imagine is like super creepy and
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  weird. Brie Larson is a great example.
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  When she was Captain Marvel, there were fan edits changing
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  her breast size, her butt size, adding more glam to her.
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  Like I think more celebrities feel conflicted about fan edits
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  than we realize because they normally don't talk about it and
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  they normally don't voice it. So the person that made the fan
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  edit said while I deleted initially as I felt it was the
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  right thing to do, fan posters have been around for as long as
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  movies have existed. I never meant to cause any harm
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  and the poster is just an homage to the original Broadway poster
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  just like the movies recreation is.
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  Also I will say that Cynthia is valid and having her feelings on
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  the matter and I'm also valid and wanting to keep my version
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  of the poster up as I truly meant no harm with it and just
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  made it as a way to show my love for the original.
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  Both can be true, and Ari was asked about it on the red carpet
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  at the like, Academy Museum Awards or whatever that gala
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  that just happened that like every celebrity went to.
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  You know, I think it's very complicated because I find AI so
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  conflicting and troublesome sometimes, but I think it's just
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  kind of such a massive adjustment period.
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  And this is something that is such a, it's so much bigger than
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  us and the fans are going to have fun and make their edits.
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  But of course, you know I sometimes.
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  It goes too far. I yeah, I think so.
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  And I have so much respect for my sister Cynthia.
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  And I love her so much. And you know, it's, it's just a
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  big adjustment. Period.
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  He was very media trained of hers, very Disney star of her
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  Disney. No, she was Nickelodeon.
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  Whatever. Yeah.
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  So she she didn't clearly didn't really want to give a solid
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  opinion one way or another. And I get that.
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  Like, she doesn't want to piss off the fans.
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  She's been dealing with fan edits for like, her entire
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  career. But she's so close with Cynthia.
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  They are taking this film so seriously.
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  And she probably wants to support, you know, someone that
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  she is like so, so close with and love so much as well.
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  So I think she handled it as best as she could in that
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  moment. All right, guys, that's it for
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  Mini scroll today. Thank you so much for listening.
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  Please remember to rate, review and subscribe.
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  Please star us on Spotify. I love you guys.
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  And there will be the interview tomorrow and then I will talk to
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  you guys on Thursday. OK, bye.