From Red To Black:the Fabrication Of"Grassroots Cyberstar" And Net Friends'Identity Construction

The cyberstars, as little fatty, brother sharp and buck-toothed brother, are pursued and extolled by net friends. I name them "grassroots cyberstar" because they all come from grass roots and expose themselves passively. In the process of fabricating the grassroots cyberstars, the net friends, the media and themselves make all their effort. They exploit the interaction in electrical media to create attractive "popular texts" through their imagination and creativity. In the colorful netscape, the gradual change between "red" and "black" is the main tone. This study strives to discuss the effect of the net friends and explore their motivation——identity construction.The net friends try to construct a more ideal ego in the net space and improve the imagination of "who I am". Meanwhile, they classify themselves as a desirable group for obtaining the sense of belonging and mission. In fact, it is net friends' self-categorization in the interpersonal and intergroup gradations. In the interpersonal gradation, they show "the ideal ego" by role-playing and feedback others' appraisal to unity "I" and "me". And in the intergroup gradation, they establish positive uniqueness for their groups with which are identified by themselves, and demarcate the boundary with the outgroups.However, the grassroots cyberstars don't possess the qualities as classics. The process from "red" to "black" is short. In this process, there're only a few net friends gain the self-identity to a certain extent, but cannot construct the group-identity because of short of groundwork of dialogue and emotion. The creation of grassroots cyberstars is just a "farce" therefore. It's an unavoidable "disease" in net-popularization. And to keep healthy need more conscience and vigilance.