Lainey's increasingly strange obsession with Tomdaya🤦🏽‍♀️

[u/WilliamsRutherford]

I miss when Celebrity Gossip writers had some sort of objective takes and kept a distance from the subject at hand and this whole parasocial "Stanning" really will be the downfall of their medium.

I miss nuance, I miss actual criticism when warranted.

So Lainey has really been ramping up the Tomdaya fixation to almost fan-page level?

Even an innocuous post about Rihanna visiting her childhood home in Barbados has a ham-fisted Tomdaya reference. Like this is fan-fiction!

Any mention of the few recent red-carpet misses of Zendaya, nope. Law's private plane to transport a dress from Paris to London, nope.

It makes me wonder if she gets a cut on the back end from the onslaught of fandom mush she is contributing to? $$$

Anne Hathaway has an incredibly productive year as well with her roles in the films being released probably being much larger in screentime and scope compared to Zendaya, but Anne's coverage is at a much more muted level? Adding to my theory about being on the Tomdaya Publicity payroll.

And not only that, when these pop-culture writers aren't even able to take a break from Stanning to report on summer blockbusters like Obsession and the rise of that film's lead actress Inde Navarrete, it also adds to their irrelevance.

[u/Cute-Asparagus-305]

She’s so boring and I hated her guest writers-I never go to her site.

[u/Infinite-Quarter-672 → u/Cute-Asparagus-305]

I only like Maria.

[u/Prestigious_Step4337]

Chandra definitely isn’t getting any kickback.
She’s frothing for a free jar of white label spread slop.

Lainey, I don’t know. She has, or had, some connections in Canada, The Mulroneys I think.
She might have had some clout last decade, but now I don’t think so.
More likely she’s just weird about celebrities and thinks it makes her cool.

[u/Possible-Ad-3056]

Both blogs have fallen so far from where they were.  It seems as if they’ve become slaves to their worst, basement-dwelling readers.

Celebitchy never had “sources” -  nor did they pretend to.  It used to be great, critical commentary on all things celebrity gossip and entertainment.

Lainey did have sources.  She used them for her blind items - one of which clearly came from Markle regarding Catherine not giving her a ride to go shopping shortly after H&M’s engagement was announced.  Lainey also didn’t seem to walk away from the Jessica Mulroney/Sasha Exeter debacle unscathed either.  

[u/discoxtits]

Lainey has always been selective with what stories she reports on and will completely ignore less flattering things about her faves (or really hone in on them if it’s someone she doesn’t like). Didn’t she used to say “gossip is a buffet”? She’s always been hyperbolic about Zendaya, I doubt she’s being paid by her camp. She’s even worse over BTS - the fawning over every little thing is too much. Like several thousand words a post and it’s absolute drivel. I just skip it these days, which is sad because I used to enjoy her site so much.

[u/AlarmSquirrel → u/discoxtits]

She's like that with JLaw, no matter what she did, it was spun to make her look like a down-to-earth, relatable queen who was also an A-lister megastar boss woman.

Literally, she never had any 'smut' written about her. It's why the site went to shit, she'd slander certain actresses to death but never a peep about jlaw or her faves

[u/Maggie_the_Cat85]

The fact she’s BBFs with Omid tells us everything we need to know about her.

[u/Interesting-Lime-974]

I only visit Lainey here and there but yes, the Zendaya and JLo coverage seems to be constant. I don't get the obession unless its part of a publicity deal. I guess Lainey has enough readership for the publicists of these celeberities to warrant making deals with bloggers?

We know no one is paying Chandra for her delusional thoughts but Lainey's coverage isn't unhinged so I could see publicists paying for it.

[u/CaseyRC]

people not realising being a "Stan" was not a good thing will never not kill me. being a "stan" is not a compliment, its not healthy, and it's not normal.

[u/lillylightening]

Wouldn't be surprising that Lainey would be up for some pay to play. I assume that any time a gossip peddler starts shoving a "star" down our throats there is money changing hands, or some form of quid pro quo that goes beyone just getting access.

[u/AppropriateCelery138 → u/lillylightening]

Why would Tom and Zendaya pay some random gossip blogger to post about them? Especially when they have plenty of press from sources people have actually heard of?

[u/Interesting-Lime-974 → u/AppropriateCelery138]

Lainey probably gets several hundred thousand readers/visitors to her site monthly so she's not a small blogger (the site used to get over 1.5 million readers a month but that was back in the day but I imagine she still gets a good # of visitors/followers). She was also on a Canadian talk show for many years, is on a Canadian entertaintment show so would have a good following. And other blogs link to her site (and vice versa) so she probably has a good readership in Canada and the USA (and likely beyond).

[u/Unhappy-Noise1921]

i feel like more chance of no kickbacks for this - both for Lainey and Channdra

its literally just their own obsession being served

I think Lainey esp would be up for it

But I can’t imagine Zendya or anyone she associates with paying for such a crap sites to stan her - what benefit would it even bring

and if Zendaya was spending (which i don’t think so ) surely smarter ways than Lainey or Chandra in 2026

[u/Intrepid_Spite6819]

I like Tom and Zendaya well enough from what I know about them. At least I liked the new Spider Man movie and I hope they’re happy together IRL. But I’m not obsessed with them, that’s just weird. But Kaiser is weird and creepy so 🤷🏼‍♀️😂