One in 10 pets on Facebook
A picture taken from a video released by Femme actuelle (Today’s Woman) shows French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s dogs during an interview in Paris with first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Sarkozy has a new-look page on the networking website Facebook, and one of the latest videos posted shows him playfully chatting with guests and kissing his supermodel wife.
One in 10 U.K. pets has their own social networking pages, according to a report in the Telegraph.
"Friends" of U.K. pets will now be able to see that the dog has been for a walk, the cat has napped, and the goldfish has been swimming.
Ten percent of U.K. pets have joined and are participating on sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, while more than half of UK pet owners are sharing photos of their pets online.
Ordinary pets have been turned into celebrities through social networking sites. These famous pets include Maru the cat, described by his owner as “a little bumbling and a little awkward.”
Yet this awkward animal is bigger than many human celebrities – having amassed more than 6 million views on YouTube, from the nearly 200 videos his owners have posted.
Maru’s following includes around 140,000 subscribers who have signed up to be notified of his next adventure.
Mark Zuckerberg’s pet dog Beast has a major online following, as does Bo the dog. He is classified as a “public figure” after being liked by nearly 1.4 million people on Facebook, and is the subject of a soon to be released book. His fans debate such things as “Is this the cutest dog on earth?”
But does Bo tweet?
Sockington the cat, who has nearly 1.5 million Twitter followers, has tweeted nearly 8,000 times.
According to the Telegraph, Neil Brettell, director of insurer PetPlan, who commissioned the study, said “animals are more popular than celebrities” on social networking sites.