<![CDATA[Ara Balears in English - famous people]]> 10 <![CDATA[The dream scenario]]> In the movie Dream Scenario they explained to us what happened when a normal person, a professor played by Nicolas Cage, became the most famous person on the planet. And not because he had done anything special: he simply started appearing in everyone's dreams. All the people in the world claimed, really or to not be left out, that they had seen Professor Matthews in their dreams, for others, a gray and forgettable character. Fame arrived in a way as gratuitous as it is currently arriving for Tim Payne, a football player from New Zealand participating in the current World Cup. Payne has done nothing to be famous; precisely, he is famous now because he wasn't. Or because he was the one with the fewest followers on social media in a team not very promising for victory (he has never won a match in a final phase). But Payne was the chosen one by an Argentine content creator to make him famous; he simply chose him and asked everyone to sympathize with him above the explosions of patriotic pride that usually underpin footballing passions. And yes, in a few days Payne went from being any footballer to having more followers on social networks than his own country has inhabitants, simply by a whim or idea of an influencer from the other side of the world, and in an even more arbitrary way than the professor in the film. In the current economy of attention, however, this is not an anecdote or a curious story. Just like in the film, the first thing the professor thought was how to take advantage of it, since nowadays having people's attention (knowing who you are and listening to you) is the main capital from which personal and collective economies can grow. So, needless to say, the footballer has gone all out; he has addressed his millions of new followers and has "thanked them for their support". Here's how the attention economy works: everything is based on capturing and maintaining people's attention, in whatever way possible, thanks to social networks, of course, which create new fame almost every day, with the same arbitrariness as dreams. Now that Payne has the attention of the masses, or of certain people on the planet, he will be able to capitalize on it: he will do advertisements, paid posts that millions of people will see, fame creates more fame and money will make more money. And it all starts from a whim or a gamble of the new digital gods, or from the frantic idleness of the new networked masses, who train themselves with the game of attention while yearning for something similar to happen to them. Or that, by a stroke of luck, some of their content goes viral; or they even do things, or live them, according to the performance they can get from them on the networks. But just like in Cage's movie, the tables can turn at any moment. The professor began to appear not in dreams but in nightmares, surrounded by blood and pain, and the infamy of being hated as gratuitously as he had previously been admired began.

]]> <![CDATA[It doesn't bother Eduardo Casanova's HIV status; what bothers him is that he says it without apologizing.]]>

Actor and director Eduardo Casanova has announced on Instagram that he is HIV-positive. "Today I break this unpleasant and painful silence after so many years. A silence that so many people with HIV keep and suffer. I'm doing it for myself, but I hope this can help more people," he wrote. That a public figure would make this decision is still news. Of course, we can all continue with our lives and the world won't stop, as a legion of trolls has been quick to proclaim. The comment sections of websites and social media have been filled with expressions of support, but also with arguments, questions, reproaches, and, ultimately, judgments that no one needed. Casanova least of all. As often happens when someone freely shares their sexual orientation, those who haven't understood anything question that "it's their business," that there's no need to broadcast it. That it's none of their business.

]]> <![CDATA[Death or no death?]]> My latest hobby is to visit the website muertonomuerto.com and spend a while guessing whether the celebrities they suggest are alive or not. They show you a photograph and you have to decide between 'Dead,' 'Not dead,' or 'I don't know who that is.' If you guess correctly, they don't warn you or congratulate you; they just tell you if you've made a mistake. It's time better spent than watching reels, a pit more of zombies than of the deceased. The challenge is to guess as many as possible while participating in what the website presents as "an experiment on the fragility of memory." Mine, which can have trouble remembering what I've eaten, works very well when it comes to famous deaths. I stopped after about 100 names. Without fail, eh, and because I ran out of seconds on the next one when a friend sent me a WhatsApp message full of exclamation points asking: "But is Ramón Sánchez Ocaña alive?!!!!!!" Meh! I had failed. It had been so long since we heard from the host of "Más vale evitar evitar" that we thought he'd passed away. After a while, another message: "Álex Angulo is dead?!!!! When did this happen?" Response: eyes-in-the-sky emoji.

]]> <![CDATA[Ana Obregón strikes a summer pose in Mallorca with her daughter Anita: "She's a clone of her father."]]>

Ana Obregón has once again struck the summer pose in Mallorca on the cover of the magazine Hello! with Anita, her two-year-and-five-month-old daughter, born from the frozen sperm of her late son. Five years after Aless's death, the actress and biologist opens the doors of El Manantial, the family residence on the Costa de los Pinos that she and her siblings have for sale. "It makes me very sad that this house is being sold. It will be difficult and hard, but I understand my siblings. It's hard to maintain such a large house, and above all, one with such an enormous emotional burden. Too many things are being said about the sale because there's nothing left to say. People from outside have come to see the house; none of them are Spanish!" the photo shoot in the mansion's gardens and pool. "What will I do in the summers with Anita? Look for somewhere else!" I would like Mallorca because it's like my second home, but I'm also very much in love with the north, for example, Cantabria..." she says about a future without El Manantial.

]]> <![CDATA[Rafael Nadal and Mery Perelló's second child is born.]]>

Former tennis player Rafael Nadal and his wife, Mery Perelló, have had the following in a hospital in Palma: her second son, whose name is Miquel.

]]> <![CDATA[Dua Lipa, on vacation in Mallorca]]>

Dua Lipa has chosen Mallorca for her vacation. The singer has posted a series of social media posts with her friends in Deià under the title "Deià with my sisters."

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