Even A Hollywood Gossip Queen Has Her Line

Lainey is living every girl's dream: Gossiping is her job.

I refuse to accept that whole accountability issue about our society being obsessed. It's Hollywood putting that out there.

Elaine "Lainey" Lui , Canada

Date Posted: 08/31/07

Reader Rating:

With humble beginnings as a self-proclaimed celebrity smut hound around the office to producing Laineygossip.com, one the hottest celeb gossip blogs in the biz, Lainey has turned her passion into her profession. Now a full-time blogger and celebrity gossip reporter for CTV's eTALK, Lainey isn't afraid to call 'em as she sees 'em - but she does have her limits. For Lainey, publicly commenting about Owen Wilson's recent suicide attempt is a no-go zone, but that doesn't mean the rest of the industry will follow suit. Here, the gossip queen shares her insights into the darker side of show biz and why we just can't get enough of the stars.

How did I get started? I am a fundraiser by profession - I raise money for social services. I was with the University of British Columbia and then I moved to Covenant House Vancouver, where I was a development officer. I had left UBC to take care of my mom (she had a kidney transplant) so when I was between jobs, I ended up sending two girlfriends a daily e-mail updating them on Hollywood happenings, just because I've been a pop culture junkie my whole life and I used to sit with them in the office and regale them with updates as to what the celebrities were doing.

When I left, they felt that they were missing that and said 'send us an e-mail everyday.' Because I wasn't doing anything, I sent them an e-mail everyday and they started sending it to their friends, who started sending it to their friends. Pretty soon, I had literally thousands of people on this e-mail distribution list, and it crashed the server. So, on a lark, I said, 'okay, maybe I'll start this website.'

We have a friend who is a web designer, and he set up this basic website for me. As soon as I was out on the Internet, it became more acceptable and reached more and more people. That's how people who are in the business or tied to the business started coming forward as sources. About five months after the website launched, eTALK called and they were interested in bringing me on as gossip correspondent and it went from there.

I don't know if it happened really quickly, but it obviously happened very unexpectedly, and I'm extremely honored and grateful for the fact there are some people who have been reading it since it started as an e-mail.