(Almost) famous

Her friends call her Blogger. In friends’ cell phones, preceding the 646 Manhattan area code, is the name Blogger. It’s even yelled out to her as she walks up the hill to her room in McNutt. “Blogger!” \nAnd when she brings out the camera and starts filming for Seventeen magazine – forget about it.\nCaitlin Keating, a 19-year-old freshman who grew up in New York City, is one of 15 women across the country participating in Seventeen magazine and MySpace.com’s “Freshman 15.” The premise of the ‘15’ is simple: 15 female college freshmen write daily MySpace blogs concerning college issues.\n“Seventeen really wanted to give its audience a chance to get a real behind-the-scenes look at what college is all about,” said Elizabeth Dye, special projects director for Seventeen magazine. \nDye also said 24 percent of all freshmen drop out during or after their first year of college. \n“It’s a very big statistic that we thought, ‘What can we do to change that?’” she said.\nTo help the magazine’s 13 million readers connect to the “Freshman 15,” the bloggers film weekly 30-second videos and monthly hour-long videos, along with posting photos online and pitching story ideas for the publication.\n“It’s a lot of work, so I have to remember to do it every day,” Keating said. “... I’ll come back from class and have all this work to do, but I’ll have to think of what to write in the blog.”\nFor Keating, the work is worth the reward. Not only does she get paid to do something she likes, but she also feels “personal satisfaction” from helping the girls who read the blog.\n“Even yesterday, I got probably five to 10 messages from girls because they saw that I go to Indiana in the magazine so they thought they could ask me questions about IU,” Keating said. “… I can help them with something that no one else can because I’m actually getting the experience.”\nWhile it may seem intrusive to put most of one’s entire life on the Internet, being “out there” is nothing new to Keating. Born like a teenager, she was mature for her age, said her mother Carrie Boretz Keating.\n“She would walk down the streets of New York at the age of two and people would stare at her … like, ‘Look at that strut,’” Boretz Keating said. \nBut a toddler swagger that belied her years would appear to be a trend for the girl who lives in a self-described world where “no one really acts their ages.”\nPhotographed drinking champagne at the age of 15 for the pages of New York magazine as part of an article about money-obsessed teenagers, Keating has been the topic of examination since before she could drive. In the article, “The Teenage Economy,” David Amsden wrote, “A charmingly laid-back girl, Caitlin says she has always felt older than her peers, secretly detached and has a tendency to view her surroundings through a vaguely anthropological lens.”\nIt is this same lens through which Keating described her and friends’ escapades for her first Seventeen magazine blog, which she wrote as a high school student. Her first foray into the blogosphere, the online diary of sorts detailed the club-hopping lifestyle of flush teens with seemingly unlimited access to the city.\n“I know that I live in this bubble … I was sort of observing myself and my friends in this disgusting world that we live in,” Keating said. \nFor fans of the “Gossip Girl” book series – stories about rich, privileged teens living on the Upper East Side of New York City – Keating’s story may seem familiar. It did to editors at Seventeen when they propositioned her to be the magazine’s real-life “Gossip Girl” when she was a high school student. However, this second blogging opportunity for Seventeen was short-lived. Following the July 2006 murder of a New Jersey teen after a night of clubbing, Keating said the editors scrapped the idea, fearing readers might take the information as advice.\nNot long after, however, Keating found out about the “Freshman 15” blog and applied. When choosing a group of women from about 1,000 applicants, diversity was important, Dye said.\n“We needed girls who represented big towns, small towns and girls who could be open and honest about their lives,” Dye said. “Certainly, where they came from was important, but it was more about where they were going. Caitlin expresses herself extremely well. She’s a great writer, and these things are important, too.”\nThe hook of Keating’s blog is that she’s a city kid thrown into the middle of a cornfield – well, not quite, but her transition from New York City to Bloomington has been somewhat of a “culture shock,” she said. \n“She was such a New York City kid, so it was good for her to lose that distinction,” Boretz Keating said, adding that it has been good for her to see her daughter challenged and uncomfortable. And though she is not one to be protective, she admits she reads the blog every day, and it has been nice to have such a unique perspective on her daughter’s life.\n“It helps me really get more of an insight into her life there, even though we do talk many times a day through e-mail and text and everything,” Boretz Keating said.\n“My dad doesn’t read it, but mom will call me and say, ‘You missed class today, Caitlin? Don’t miss class,’” Keating said.\nKeeping up with classes is especially important for Keating because it could determine her future. If she gets the required 3.3 grade point average to get into the Liberal Arts Management Program, she’ll do that. If she only makes a 3.0, she’ll apply to the Kelley School of Business. Either way, she said, there’s a good chance that she will end up working in the magazine business like her parents. Her mother is the photo editor at GOLF MAGAZINE, and her father is a freelance photographer who is currently taking photos in China for Vanity Fair.\nHowever, Boretz Keating said she doesn’t think her daughter will become a journalist. It’s pretty much up in the air for Keating as to what she wants to do with her life, her mother said. \n“I love the fact that it is (up in the air),” Boretz Keating said. “Who should be so self-assured at that age?”