Guest Post: What Is Fame?

Quick note: A couple spots just opened up for Camp FI Florida. This momentous event will happen January 5th through the 8th. Mrs. 1500 and I will be giving an epic talk (in my mind anyway) on:

• dinosaurs (not really)
• the Spartans
• a certain attendee’s career as a TV star
• crying at work
• more dinosaurs (still no)
• the meaning of life

And I’m the weak link in this group. Other attendees include:

• J.D. Roth: It will be surreal speaking in front of one of the people who showed me the way
• Physician on Fire
• Brad and Jonathan from ChooseFI
• Billionaire real estate mogul and author, Scott Trench from BiggerPockets
• Doug Nordman from The Military Guide
• Joe from Adventuring Along
• Joel from FI 180

Email campfi2018@gmail.com for all of the juicy details! Hope to see you there!

I was at a Minimalist Party a couple months ago and the topic of blogging came up. An attendee named Andrew mentioned he had a blog. I asked him what the name of it was:

Ovals of Life

Yes, Andrew speaks in hyperlinks.

Anyway, I grabbed my phone and pulled up his site. Within minutes, I was laughing like a crazy, drunk person. I’m reasonably sane and had only finished half of one beer, so I knew that Andrew’s writing was hilarious. I liked it so much that I asked him to write a guest post. He did.

Before we get to that, Andrew has also written a book which is pretty great called Don’t Listen To Your Parents:

It’s funny and touching; a fine Kindle stuffer for anyone on your list. Plus, it’s only $.99. Plus, it has great lines like this in it:

Life is life. So live.

Take it away Andrew.

What is Fame? And Is Mr. 1500 “Famous?” Let’s Find Out Together…

The only people who care about fame are those who don’t have it. – Albert Einstein, probably

My whole life, I’ve been trying to obtain this unrealistic goal of becoming “famous.”

My parents loved me. They gave me enough attention. But I wanted more.

I crave acceptance from strangers and cool people and friends. One way to get that is to become famous.

But I don’t know how to get to that point. Some say:

Don’t focus on the fame; it’ll come naturally without you trying.

Others say:

Follow the fame formula, and you’ll get there.

That’s why I was skeptical when a friend introduced me to a celebrity named Mr. 1500.

Mr. 1500 note: Andrew uses celebrity in the loosest of terms here…

He didn’t have paparazzi following him around. Sure, he had a friend named Evan who may have been his secret bodyguard (or a good friend — there’s no way of knowing). He was nice, which was different. Most celebrities are jerks and donkeys.

Mr. 1500 note: Evan is a retired friend. And while he is not my secret bodyguard, he worked in a special division of law enforcement and is a Jack Reacher type. Don’t mess with Evan.

More importantly, he liked my writing. So the celebrity said:

Write a blog post for me.

And I jumped at the opportunity to write a blog post for a semi-famous person. 

At first, this post was gonna ask one simple question:

How did Carl become famous?

But that’s easy to figure out…

Step 1: Do something crazy, like retire in three years

Step 2: Provide value through actions

Step 3: Repeat Step 2 forever

Instead, let’s ask ourselves one question:

Is Mr. 1500 famous?

The Criteria For Measuring Fame

As a dude with a math degree, I figured I could measure fame through certain criteria. The easiest way is to count the number of followers a celebrity has on social media. But there are more factors, like the fame within a certain subculture and the value he/she provides to their followers. All of these factors are considered for the final verdict.

Side note: some of these numbers are real, but most of the numbers you see below are made-up. Underneath this outgoing and confident personality, I’m a baby and a wimp, a shy boy waiting for his mommy to return home from work. And I’m too nervous to ask Carl directly for the exact numbers.

One of these days I’ll put on big-boy pants and ask people for answers to my questions. For now, I’d rather make up numbers than do the simple thing and ask.

Anyway, let’s get down to it.

Number of Followers

These were all pretty easy to find.

• Twitter — 7,721
• Facebook — 1,854
• Email subscribers — on the website, Carl says, “Join the 10s who have signed up already.” According to my calculations, that’s roughly 47 email subscribers.

To make life easier for all of us, let’s just say Carl has 10,000 followers. A nice, round number. If I were in Carl’s shoes, I would stop at 1,500 followers, just to stay consistent with the brand.

Number of Times Mentioned on National Media Outlets

If we look at the different websites on his Hire Us page, we can see that Mr. (and Mrs.) 1500 have been mentioned on eleven (11) websites, either as a subject of an interview or as a guest blogger:

• CNBC
• Business Insider
• AOL Small Business Blog
• Yahoo!
• MSN
• Oprah
• Mr. Money Mustache
• Investment Zen
• Budgets Are Sexy
• Rockstar Finance

And my favorite article? Penzcentrum. I can’t read any of the article, but I recognized two words: 1500days.com and Budapest. Must be a Hungary website hungry for attention.

Number of Autographs Signed Per Day

In his every day life, Mr. 1500 is probably not hounded by fans at restaurants. Which means he doesn’t have to go through the secret back entrance to stay away from the crazy people.

Mr. 1500 note: I have been called out exactly one time in public. It was at my children’s school. Sometimes, friends and family do find out about the blog through the mainstream media. When they do, they are usually confused and uncomfortable. If the blog comes up at all in conversations, someone quickly redirects back to the weather or baseball scores.

Instead, his autographs appear only at FI conventions and events.

According to my calculation, Carl goes to one FI event per month — he was at the PopUp Business School in September and went to San Diego in October for some other convention. I wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing in San Diego. I just saw the beautiful pictures of the California sunset on Twitter.

Extrapolate those two events out to a year, and that’s about twelve (12) events per year. We can estimate that he signs his name at least 100 times at each event, which comes out to 1,200 autographs per year. Divide that by 365 days in a year, and we come up with 3.29 autographs per day.

Mr. 1500 note: 1,200 autographs is 1,200 more than I sign in a typical year.

(Wait, hold on: Let’s assume 1.0 autographs is the entire name. What would 0.5 autographs look like? Half of the name? And if it’s half the name, would it be just the first name? Or would you split the name up into letters and only sign half of the number of letters in both the first and last name? Like, my name is Andrew Krehbiel — that’s a total of 14 letters. So, for me, 0.5 autographs would be “Andrew K.” How convenient.

Now, what would 0.29 autographs look like?)

Does the Celebrity Have Beef with Another Celebrity?

I wouldn’t call it beef, but it’s a simple disagreement. Some dude named Robert Kiyosaki strongly dislikes both Mr. and Mrs. 1500 — and wrote about it. Then Carl responded to Kiyosaki’s blog post with one of his own. In the blogging world, that’s celebrity beef.

And in the FI blogging world, they’re fighting with FIRE.

But their blog posts didn’t ruin the industry’s reputation. If anything, it helped both brands grow and legitimize each other through civil discourse.

If you don’t have a beef with someone, you’re not a true celebrity. If you’re hated, that means you’re doing something right. And Mr. 1500 is doing something right.

Mr. 1500 note: Andrew makes some valid points here. I do get my share of hate mail. There is even another blogger who has it out for me.

When Celebrity Says “Jump,” How High Do His/Her Followers Jump?

Lots of people engage with Carl and his blog. As an outsider, I’m seeing the value Carl is providing. So, when Carl says, “Jump,” his followers would jump about ten (10) inches off the ground. That’s pretty good — Oprah’s followers would have a nine-inch vertical, and that’s from jumping off the couch.

Miscellaneous Fame Statistics

Below are some other questions about famous people:

• Does the celebrity have their own Halloween costume? I could not find a “Mr. 1500 Halloween Costume” on Google. If you want to dress up like Carl for Halloween, wear a flannel shirt and spew out investment facts.
• How many free gifts does the celebrity receive from strangers each year? Roughly 5% of someone’s followers give the celebrity’s family something in the mail each year, which comes out to 500 free gifts for Mr. and Mrs. 1500. Just a guess.
• How many new emails arrive in the celebrity’s mailbox every day? I receive 10 new emails a day, and Carl is ten times more famous than me. Therefore, he receives 100 new emails per day.
• Does the celebrity have a catchy nickname? Check. The “Mr.” makes the name official and proper and legit. And humans can relate to round, even numbers like 1500. Good thing he’s not “Dr. Mr. 1504, Founder of the Independence of the Financial Freedoms Act of 2013.”
• Does the celebrity mow their own yard? Carl is a humble celebrity. He mows his own lawn. End of discussion.

Speaking of end of discussion,

Is Mr. 1500 Famous?

Yes and no.

Mr. 1500 is famous. But he’s a nice celebrity. And nice celebrities don’t exist.

Even after all my research, I still don’t know if Carl is famous.

Thanks for that Andrew.

And I was serious when I said you should buy his book. Andrew is a gifted writer. Can’t spare $.99? Leave a comment and I’ll email a couple lucky readers a free Kindle edition of the book. And make sure you check out his blog too. Funny:

• You Might be Lonely If (Caution! Very naughty stuff here!)
• Did you notice the dinosaur in the iPhone X commercial? I don’t know how I missed it.
• The Ultimate Guide to Streaking
• Don’t hit on your waitress

What are you still doing here?

 

Life is life. So Live. -Andrew