Perfect. You two can fight over Luke, cause a distraction and I'll make a woo-line for Nicky.

Manslut.

Woo-line, lol

Honestly, some of the tweets these girls send, the needy passive-aggresive ones, it'd be enough to put someone off girls for life.























ZOMG!!! \o/

Made my night

Quick, somebody shoot them all with a dart gun!

*tips hat*

(ps you can return the favour by getting me a follow. In a way that won't make me die of cringe )

He got 6.7k likes for posting a picture of his sausage sandwich .

Madness. Mind it does look good. The best thing about coming back to Scotland is a square sausage

Bet they'll all be posting that now. Irn Bru is so passé!

Pure filth!

*goes searching*

*Steals hat, turns it into a thinking cap, gets to work*

Is it wrong that I find myself avoiding Twitter at the moment?

Depends why you're avoiding it. Why are you avoiding it?

Luke Friend Q&A. Some of the girls on there are just...

Hey singlefish


You probably made Red faint, posting that

Mmpfb too by the looks of things


Square sausage is the dog's. Hopefully not literally

But god, yes, we need a twitter sausage watch to monitor this (I fully realise that that sounds wrong in every way possible!).

They are, totally. I'm steering clear of that # for exactly the same reason.

I'd love to know what they honestly think of them, both Luke and Nick, I know they say all the right things about loving them but I do wonder how true that is. I actually think I'd be a bit (more than just a bit, tbh) disappointed if they really were just totally lapping it up and loving every second of it, I can understand appreciating the attention but not revelling in it.

- someone ask Luke on his Q&A (like he'd answer *insert rolleyes*)

To be perfectly honest with you, they're kind of ruining it for me. I was misbehaving with a few other Friendies on Twitter last night, but it was all in good fun and you KNEW we were joking with some of the things we were saying. But these other randomers are just totally cringy, claiming that they'll die and literally begging to be followed, and it makes me never want to read anything about either Nicholas or Luke ever again on social media.

I'll take up sausage watching duties

Oh why, what are they asking/saying?

I don't really know about Luke as obviously I haven't been paying as much attention, but I've generally been very encouraged by how Nicky seems to be handling it all. He seems genuinely overwhelmed and happy for the support and attention, and grateful of it without it turning his head so much. i.e. he's happy to pose for pictures and be friendly but he doesn't seem to be all 'ooh what can I get out of this'. He just seems to take it all in his stride, keeps his feet on the ground and appears to not take it all entirely seriously. His family seem very grounded so I guess that has a lot to do with it and hopefully it will remain that way. It would be awful to see him lose that positive and open quality which is a big part of his appeal imo. Things like the fact that he went down and did that gig in Torquay, left in a car surrounded by screaming girls and then went straight back to Scotland because he couldn't wait to get out on his motorbike seem like a really good sign he's going to remain grounded.

It does surprise me, having said that, that some of his fans seem to have his phone number or have him on snapchat, and quite blatantly boast about it on twitter, sometimes offering to trade them to other girls. I guess that might have happened much earlier on, when he didn't know how far he would get in the competition and he was looking to drum up support, and perhaps he regrets it a little now. I do remember after boot camp when I started following him on twitter he invited everyone to add him on Facebook, pre-fanpage. Obviously I didn't, because I'm a hairy man and that would be weird, but I do follow his personal page and it's clear a lot of the people posting on his pictures and statuses (at least the ones i can see) are just fans who don't actually know him and also sometimes trolls posting shitty things. I suspect, in retrospect, he would probably prefer to have kept his personal profile completely private, but it is what it is. I guess he can't really cull people at the moment for fear of prompting a hormonally charged backlash.

I guess one can never be quite sure how all this will play out. But I'm hopeful, from what I've seen, that he's got a very healthy attitude about it all, and sees it as the strange, abstract and surreal byproduct of his chosen career rather than a real, tangible thing that means anything other than that people like his singing. Having said all that, if in a years time we start getting JA-type stores about sleeping with fans etc while eating Nandos and drinking Irn Bru, then it'll be time for sadfaces, but I get the feeling his family and friends are a very, very secure unit and he clearly values them above everything, so fingers crossed for him.

I guess I am just feeling very disillusioned right now.

I feel exactly, really exactly, the same, that they ruin it. There's no hope of an actually interesting Q&A because it's all just screaming, out of their minds little girls. And I know I'm at least as guilty as others of the pisstaking crap we pull here but it's taking the piss out of what seems to be 95% of their fanbase who will pay for (enable) anything they release. And who'll ruin (or at least weaken) what they release by making sure it's teenie friendly rather than something more complex/interesting/worthwhile.

If it wasn't for you guys on this thread (and a couple of other posters elsewhere) I would have moved on from the xfactor forum long ago, and would just be keeping an ear out for what Luke did next or occasionally popping into the main forum when I'm bored. I've never witnessed this frenzy before and it horrifies and repulses and fascinates me. Watching the twitter mentions was entertaining at first, but now it's just freaking me out, it's horrible. I feel just as turned off as you.

sorry, another essay

Do you mean disillusioned by Luke for encouraging it, or just generally ****ed off?

- personally, I feel both

Both. Although I've not really seen Luke encouraging it, it just happens regardless lol.

Aw.

FWIW I get the impression Luke has his head screwed on as well. I think he's too chilled to get completely swept up in the more over-the-top adulation. And he's clearly very focussed on his craft, as opposed to the trappings. And I very much hope that's true for Nicky too, that he's focussed on his love for singing (which he clearly absolutely adores) and not the surrounding noise.

But yeah, I do find myself a bit disheartened at times that one could send a perfectly pertinent and relevant tweet, and it'll never get seen amongst all the teenage drooling and screaming for attention - so one ends up a little torn because obviously it's GOOD that he gets all this attention, because it's a good platform to build a career off of, but on the other hand, I'd like to be able to drop a tweet saying 'hey listen to this' or 'this is why I really ****ing rate your voice' without it being swamped by 'omgfolowmeilysmudntunderstand'.

It's signal to noise ratio - they're both subject to a LOT of noise at the moment. Hopefully that will calm down, and they will both come through it all well-adjusted, with sustainable careers and maybe a little more accessible to meaningful communication (i.e. Nicky follows me ).

I suppose this is where DM comes in handy?