n. A person, particularly one with little or no talent, who is briefly famous.
2010
The advent of reality television has created a subdivision in the halls of fame where ordinary people, innocent of any performance skills or without any particular achievement, may acquire celebrity of a fleeting kind. But such "celetoids" must be distinguished from celebrities proper who make a career out of performing themselves.
2010
A celetoid is only allowed so much time in the spotlight. Of course, just when you think your life as a celetoid has passed, you end up writing an article about your experience six years later, or you sing a song for a friend at a wedding.
2001 (earliest)
I propose celetoid as the term for any form of compressed, concentrated, attributed celebrity. I distinguish celetoids from celebrities because, generally, the latter enjoy a more durable career with the public. …
Examples include lottery winners, one-hit wonders, stalkers, whistle-blowers, sports' arena streakers, have-a-go-heroes, mistresses of public figures and the various other social types who command media attention one day, and are forgotten the next.
Examples include lottery winners, one-hit wonders, stalkers, whistle-blowers, sports' arena streakers, have-a-go-heroes, mistresses of public figures and the various other social types who command media attention one day, and are forgotten the next.
The etymology of this term is obscure and the coiner, the sociologist Chris Rojek, does not explain its derivation. My guess is that it combines the word celebrity with the suffix -oid meaning "having the form of; resembling," with the extra t tossed in for pronounceability and to echo existing words such as factoid and planetoid.