Let’s define fame as: have I ever heard of you?
The most famous would be the person who the most other people have heard of… in history.
Famous people now have a disadvantage because there’s all these humans who can’t have heard of them because they’re dead. It’s impossible for a peasant in 1700 to have heard of Taylor Swift, but he can have heard of Shakespeare.
So you’d think it would be an old person, but here is a stat that will blow your mind.
7% of all humans who ever lived are alive today. (that stat seems to have its origin here: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-many-people-have-ever-lived-on-earth/, seems broadly plausible, but also maybe an underestimate, given our fame clock probably starts around 1000 B.C., in that we don’t know anyone before that)
There are way more humans today.
Largely due to the massive advances in food production (due to technology and better institutions):
So, we have so many more people around today. That means someone famous now has the chance to be known by billions, whereas it was millions in the past.
The world has also become more interconnected. Back then you sort of wandered around near your birth village and then died in that same village. The average American travels >10,000 miles a year and can access news or images from all corners of the world on their smart phone. Further—
87%. That’s the global literacy rate today vs. 10% around 1800.
So today famous people can go global more than ever, because we are more interconnected and able to communicate with each other.
And yet, social media has fragmented us into information silos. It’s hard to be mega-famous like Michael Jackson, Madonna or Michael Jordan were.
The most famous person is probably then someone whose fame peaked around 2010, before social media took off, but when world population was high enough to reach the most number of people.
That person would be… Cristiano Ronaldo:
Below is the social rankings, you can see Ronaldo tops the list:
People might say Michael Jackson was more famous, and I’d agree, but the world has added 3 Billion people since Michael Jackson’s fame apex, Ronaldo is picking up way more of those new people than MJ, while also being exposed to the all the people who know MJ.
Other candidates like the Pope, Trump or Obama seem to have less global appeal to me than Ronaldo. Soccer is played virtually everywhere, kids in small villages know Ronaldo and Messi. Trump and Obama are America-brained picks.
But I feel like I’m forgetting someone…
Oh yeah, Jesus.
Most people today have heard of Jesus, so he racks up all the current numbers. Plus all the people since 0, the year that’s literally 0 because of him. And he’s a figure in Islam as well, so Muslims will have heard of him as well.
Jesus is definitely 1.
Jesus
Ronaldo
?????
Either way I think we’ve learned the key to fame is great abs.
But let me know in the comments, who is number 3? Is there someone I’m missing.
