Star Jones Reynolds, co-host of The View, is getting massive attention on the web after being fired from the ABC talkshow. She ranks number one on AOL and number three on the top overall searches on Yahoo!, since yesterday, only beaten out by the World Cup 2006 and Britney Spears. It might strike you as surprising that an offline daytime talk show host with a largely middle-age following is so popular among online users. In fact, the behind-the-scenes drama among television divas is certainly a watercooler topic. Many online forums are filled with postings about the disconnect that high-profile network TV stars have with real-life and how “fake” and “self-absorbed” they are perceived to be. Besides the gossip value of Star Jones’ and Barbara Walters’ catfight, there is also a lesson here about our perceptions of online audiences. Online is not just for teenagers and young adults. In fact, Yahoo! searches on "soap operas" rose 126% at the start of the week. Women are responsible for 83%, and over half of these searches are from fans 35-54 years old. Additionally, searches on "abc soaps," "cbs soaps," and "nbc soaps" surge weekly. Yahoo’s buzz log also notes that "Dustin's Days of Our Lives Page," which chronicles the show's many twists and turns, regularly appears among the Buzz's top 6,000 searches.

http://buzz.yahoo.com/overall

http://abc.go.com/theview

http://www.starjones.com