Fan mail

Fan mail is mail sent to a public figure, especially a celebrity, by their admirers or "fans". In return for a fan's support and admiration, public figures may send an autographed poster, photo, reply letter or note thanking their fans for their encouragement, gifts, and support. Fan mail sent to public figures can be through postal mail, email, social media websites, and other platforms that allow fans and users to communicate with their favorite public figures.

Overview

Fan mail may be in the form of letters, cards, artworks, gifts, comments on social media accounts, and so on. People send fan mail to various public entertainers and public figures such as politicians, athletes, actors, artists, writers, singers, bands, coaches of sport teams, bloggers, and social media stars. Responses can take a great deal of time to come or never come at all. Since a major celebrity or public figure may receive thousands of pieces of fan mail every day, it is usually impossible for him/her to reply to or read them all and as a result his/her managers, or management team, often have the duty of canvassing the incoming mail.^[1] Normally fan mail should be sent to the office of the celebrity's management as there are websites such as FanMail.Biz and FanMail that will provide and list addresses for fans. Addresses listed are often those of the public figures management and representative team within the Hollywood business. In addition to the websites that list addresses, there are many tips on how to go about writing a fan letter and the etiquette of doing so.^[2]

Entertainment Portrayal of Fan Mail

This gimmick has also been used with fictional characters; special episodes of Beavis and Butt-head featured mail sent to the two, and the Homestar Runner website regularly features E-mails sent to and answered by the cartoon's main antagonist, Strong Bad. Public reading and answering of fan mail was a common recurring element of the cult television program Mystery Science Theater 3000. TLC's third studio album was named FanMail, and was a tribute to fans, with the names of many fans that had sent them fan mail over the years included in the album's insert.

Responses

Many fan mail responses started off as autographed photos but has slowly evolved to communication through social media. Many celebrities and public figures such as Taylor Swift and J. K. Rowling have been known to respond to fans, and sometimes haters, through Tumblr and Twitter. There have been many occasions in which J. K. Rowling has interacted with fans through her Twitter account.^[3] Taylor Swift has also been known to go out of her way to respond to her fans and admirers and even send fans gift packages, a form of fan mail, to selected fans who she had learned about through their social media accounts.^[4] While some public figures have responded to fans via social media, it is often known that responses via postal mail by public figures are scarce or nonexistent and often not personal responses but responses by a public figure's management team.

References