How A Dog Goes From 0 To 1.2 Million Instagram Followers In A Year
This week on the Reply All podcast, we try to answer a question that seems simple but ends up being very, very, complicated: What is the formula for Internet dog fame?
We talk to Shirley Braha, who owns one of the most popular dogs on Instagram β Marnie. Marnie is a very adorable 12-year old Shih Tzu. She's lopsided and a bit goofy-looking, with a tongue that's permanently wagging outside of her mouth.
The most popular Marnie Vine has been played 55 million times.
Shirley rescued Marnie from a shelter in Connecticut in late 2012. At the time, she was apparently on the verge of death β blind in one eye, with a nasty cough and bacteria in her mouth. Shirley cleaned up her up and did what anyone who falls in love with a pet does β she started posting photos of her online.
It wasn't until a year later, when Buzzfeed wrote about her account, that Marnie went from a couple thousand followers up into the many thousands, and then Instagram featured her on their front page and she entered the Internet celebrity dog stratosphere. She now has 1.2 million followers and counting. When she skipped the World Dog Awards, TMZ covered the scandal: "Marnie the Dog REJECTS World Dog Awards Invite: I'm Too Famous, Bitches."
Marnie's owner, Shirley, lives in New York, and whenever she goes to a party, she takes Marnie with her. Which means Marnie has been photographed with a list of celebrities which is hilarious and absurd in its scope: Tina Fey, the entire cast of The Big Bang Theory, Taylor Swift, Betty White, Ed Sheeran, Jason Schwartzman, Wilmer Valderrama, Grimes, Joe Jonas, Lena Dunham, Demi Lovato and Larry King.
Marnie's not alone in the million-follower range, but she's unusual in that most of the other dogs with massive online followings are conventionally attractive. Purina-commercial cute.
For instance, Menswear Dog, a very pretty Shiba Inu whose owners style him like a Williamsburg hipster.
There's also Boo, a Pomeranian who has 17 million fans on Facebook, although the scuttlebut on Boo is that some of her success comes from the fact that her owner is actually a Facebook employee.
Or Jiff, another Pomeranian, with a million Instagram followers.
And of course, the uncontested winner of the online dog popularity contest is Maru Taro, an eerily-perfect Japanese Shiba Inu who everyone seems to agree is the Internet's most popular dog.
Marnie is a Paul Giamatti in a world of Brad Pitts. But over the past year, she has become so popular that Shirley quit her job to focus exclusively on Marnie's career as an adored Internet dog. So how does a 12-year-old shelter rescue become a contender for the most popular dog on the Internet in the space of a year? Just what is the appeal? And what is life like when you quit your job to become your dog's full time publicity manager?
Find out on this week's Reply All where we talk not only to Marnie's owner Shirley, but Maru Taru's owner Shinjiri Ono, about their dogs and what makes them famous.
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