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July 1st, 2009 by Nick Bishop

Twitter imposters

One casualty of the Katie Price Peter Andre falling out has been Jordan lookalikes; the work has dried up. The celebrity impersonation business is fickle, a classic boom and bust industry. But it’s not too difficult to understand the industry’s appeal, even if it’s a little weird and demanding of our sympathy.

What’s weirder and completely beyond my comprehension is why the impersonation business has extended into the corporate world. Unless bent on being malicious, why would anyone want to pretend to be American Airlines? Or Exxon Mobil?
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But should Exxon Mobil or American Airlines be troubled by this? Corporate twitter accounts are mostly dull; nothing more than another channel for spewing out company news. Their followers, I assume, are followers for self-interested reasons only. Taking lessons from Jordan might not be something you’d want to tell people about, but tolerating a slew of harmless impersonators is not a bad strategy for extending the reach of your brand.