Live 8: Why use celebrities?

The number of blogs around the world writing about Live 8 is reaching about 10000 as of now. However, instead of promoting Live 8 and the cause behind it, that is to pressure the G8 leaders as they meet to cancel the debts of Africa, saving the lives of millions from that continent, many of these blogs are actually skeptical of using celebrities in such a concert to speak the message.
One such blog totally bashed the people behind this, the celebrities and even accused the campaign as acting as a free publicity for these celebrities. Many of them are skeptical that these freaking rich celebrities’ voices has any effect at all in changing the minds of the G8 leaders.

What do I think? I don’t think the matter is as simple as celebrities and the people donating their money to stop poverty. A research was done to find out whether celebrity endorsements in ads and campaigns work at all. The research found that using celebrities can actually change people’s minds due to their credibility, their celebritiy and ability to stand out. Would the world have known what the heck is this One campaign, if not for the mega concert and some celebrities talking about it? Some people might be searching for a video of Brad Pitt only to find the one of him talking about the One campaign and therefore they became aware of such a thing. Those people who are going to the concert may be going just to watch U2 or something, and they may not do anything after that, but at least they became AWARE of such a cause. The seed is planted, that’s the most important thing. The decision is up to the one who heard it.

Anyways, at least somebody is doing something at all about poverty, which has been a neverending issue in the world. If you don’t support this campaign, don’t just blog about the negatives of it, how about starting your own ideal campaign. Will your message get across the world?