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While Smith railed against the modern tabloid era, the Vanessa to her Ariel (a reference for Disney adults and children alike) is likely a gossip blogger who appeared in the mid-2000s: Perez Hilton.<\/a> For as hated as he was (by journalists and celebrities alike), Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr. changed the tabloid landscape with his self-titled blog, Perez Hilton. (\u201cPerez\u201d for his Latin roots, \u201cHilton\u201d as in Paris Hilton, who was at that time an easy and lucrative target.) He wasn\u2019t the only one doing it\u2014there was also Trent Vanegas\u2019s Pink Is the New Blog, Michael K\u2019s DListed, and Elaine Lui\u2019s LaineyGossip\u2014but Hilton\u2019s nasty brand of commentary was uniquely addictive. It fought back against the neutered state of both tabloid and magazine journalism, with Hilton\u2019s memorable Microsoft Paint decorating celeb photos. (Sometimes with jokey Mad Libs\u2013esque quotes, sometimes squiggles and dots alluding to cum or cocaine. Sometimes both.)<\/p>\n Hilton was more than problematic, even in his own day: He regularly outed closeted actors, made jokes about celebs\u2019 weight, and spread gossip about the lives of underage stars. (He even prematurely reported Fidel Castro\u2019s death in 2007.) \u201cI\u2019m more trustworthy than Page Six,\u201d Hilton once bragged to Radar in 2006. And while the First Amendment protected the blogger from at least one defamation lawsuit (one of a number of suits filed against him; the lengthy \u201cLegal issues and controversies\u201d section of his Wikipedia page speaks for itself), no one was visiting Perez Hilton for accuracy.<\/p>\n Reading the site felt like hearing a juicy, whispered story from a friend\u2014the OK, don\u2019t repeat this, but . . . type of gossip, the I\u2019ve heard this from a few people, and . . . type of gossip, the type of gossip that was a dash of hearsay, a bit of conjecture, and 100 percent entertainment. Just how your favorite group text might be today, Hilton wasn\u2019t bogged down by a set of journalistic ethics.<\/p>\n Until, at least, the culture caught up with him. In 2010, Hilton posted a video to YouTube called \u201cI\u2019m Going to Be Doing Things Differently\u201d in response to bullying accusations, and only a couple years later he appeared on Oprah\u2019s Lifeclass in a segment called \u201cHow Perez Hilton Changed the Negative Energy in His Life,\u201d telling Oprah, \u201cI don\u2019t want to be that person anymore . . . I want to use my platform for good.\u201d His pseudo-redemption tour continued through the aughts, but Hilton couldn\u2019t quite figure out how to use these modern, post-WordPress platforms in a way that stuck with the gen pop: He was banned from TikTok in 2020 after criticizing influencer Charli D\u2019Amelio for dancing in a bikini. The celebrity kingmaker had finally been officially exiled from the royal court. (\u201cI am feeling numb, and I don\u2019t want to seem overly dramatic, but I feel like my world is crumbling,\u201d he said in a video response to the ban. \u201cThis feels like a death to me.\u201d)<\/p>\n Hilton came and went, but the internet had discovered how fun gossip could be without the tabloids. Online culture pulled celebrity blinds from message boards to the mainstream. Crazy Days and Nights, a no-frills, text-heavy site run by \u201cEnty Lawyer\u201d (since outed as a lawyer named John Nelson), regularly ran unvetted, anonymous bits of gossip written in entertaining code language. Gawker launched its own controversial celeb feature in 2006, the \u201cGawker Stalker<\/a>\u201d: a Google map that pinpointed submitted celebrity sightings throughout NYC. It had a catchy title and a greater purpose: Gawker\u2019s mandate was to break down the decades-old pay-for-play systems of tabloid media. (And stir up a little controversy along the way? Sure, why not.) You couldn\u2019t actually stalk celebs with the Gawker Stalker because it wasn\u2019t posted in real time\u2014but its threatening name had the feature shut down within the year. \u201cWe completely acknowledge that there are very many creepy people out there, but the truth is, if there is someone really intending to do a celebrity harm, there are much better ways to go about doing that than looking at the Gawker Stalker,\u201d Gawker editor Jessica Coen said to the Associated Press. \u201cIf you\u2019re using the map to do that, you are a really bad stalker.\u201d Not to mention, these posts were gossip minutiae that would barely be of interest to even a tabloid magazine: \u201cSpotted outside the Carroll St. stop on the F line, Saturday 10\/15: Paul Giamatti, looking like he was waiting for someone, pushing an empty baby stroller. He was looking comfortably disheveled, as one would expect, but his hair (or what\u2019s left of it) had grown a little longer perhaps than it should.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n