Smart Stardom: Advanced Digital Technologies and the Replication of Celebrity (Routledge Focus on Digital Media and Culture)

Smart Stardom explores how contemporary celebrities are digitally replicated and re-circulated through advanced technologies including artificial intelligence, machine learning, computer-generated imagery, real-time rendering, and virtual and augmented media. Discussing how these digital developments produce highly compelling virtual versions of real stars - what the book terms the “smart star” - whose digital identities remain anchored to recognisable, real-world figures, the authors explore how these virtual celebrities generate economic and cultural value through familiarity, affective connection, and nostalgia, while also embodying urgent questions about consent, ownership, and the control of famous faces and voices.Drawing on a wide range of global case studies from film, music, advertising, activism, and politics, Smart Stardom examines how key figures are mobilised to help audiences engage with emerging digital environments, and how celebrity operates as a key point of entry int