After attending both NetRoots Nation and Blogher last week, it appears that I am making waves toward becoming a “social media starlet.”

As I become known for the fanatical use of my Blackberry, the ability to Tweet and Flickr from anywhere, in addition to jet-setting at web 2.0 conferences - I begin to wonder: is this really the best use of my time, and intellect? What is the greater cause at hand? Am I really helping anyone beyond myself in these ventures? At this point, well, no, not really. While I can use my skillz for work at New Media Strategies, sometimes it all feels like one big vanity project. But then I think - maybe at 23 that shouldn’t be a concern? And maybe it takes a little self promotion to actually get yourself to the point of being able to make a difference in the first place.

These introspective thoughts stemmed from reading the Wired cover story featuring one of the most self-aggrandizing social media starlets: Julia Allison. The piece basically described how she was able to make herself go from nobody to somebody by using social media promotion and exploitation of her life for content. Ms. Allison realized that she could conquer the nerd universe as a sexy-brunette, merely by showing up and using the medium at hand. While many will criticize her methods, it is ultimately working in her favor to earn her some cash, some fame and catapult her business career.

And while I’d like to critique her seemingly shallow methods to gain notoriety, it also seems that Ms. Allison has subscribed to my theory about women using every asset they have - physical and mental - to break through the male paradigm.

For Ms. Allison, her method to madness comes down to a smart business strategy. At the end of the day, she did what she wanted to do: she earned press about her newest internet portal, www.nonsociety.com, in a major magazine within the tech community. This will ultimately be a lucrative venture and create greater exposure about her endeavors.

But will it get her any closer to her dream - of being a published book author?

Apparently, yes. Or at least that is the plan.

Morra Aarons-Mele wrote a great post on Blogher today, praising Ms. Allison’s ability to wear her ambition on her sleeve. Unlike men, this is something that many women shy away from. While Morra also sees the Catch-22 of Allison’s seemingly shallow and opportunistic online ventures, she points out a very interesting caveat:
Turns out, Allison is the Paris Hilton of the Internet. Through Twitter and constant blogging of her sexy twentysomething life, she’s famous. I was half jealous and half disgusted. When I was a moderately sexy twentysomething, it never would have occurred to me to make hay from my exploits. Who would take you seriously? And how could your ambition be that naked? Then I read the follow up email Julia sent to Wired editor Chris Anderson. Explaining her path to celebrity, Allison writes,

“The true goal was never “fame” at all. I wanted two things: 1) editors to publish my work, 2) people to read my work. I wanted to be like Nora Ephron - able to exist creatively with an audience and relative financial freedom…”

Ah-ha: classic female tactic. Allison claims her ambition is driven by a larger purpose and to fulfill a larger more socially acceptable role. She doesn’t want to be famous for nothing- she wants to be a writer. But still, I have to give the girl credit for creativity. It’s really hard to break through to that editorial page (84% of op-eds are written by men). If Julia Allison can get her body of work quickly noticed by using the virtues of other body parts, well, then I have to consider that. It’s not often you hear a woman so baldly cop to wanting to get ahead.
So, in the end, I do appreciate Allison’s objective to blaze a path in a world that is ultimately not always in her favor. In promoting herself and her femininity, she has ultimately created a new throne in an overwhelmingly patriarchal society.

My question now is once you earn the power, the fame and the money - what will you decide what to do with it? Will Ms. Allison ultimately do good for others, or just herself? To me, that will be the ultimate judge of her character, in addition to the industry that made her a social media starlet in the first place.