Have you ever wanted to be famous? Maybe it's better if you're not.

It must be awful to be famous.

I'm sure there are perks, like getting a good table in a posh restaurant, assuming you're famous in a good way.

But the downside, especially in the age of social media and search engine marketing, is that too many people are watching you — speculating about everything you do, snapping unflattering photos, catching some stupid thing you do or say — and worse.

Do you ever get the feeling we know too much about people these days? That well-known people are maybe a little too well-known?

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And sadly, you don't actually have to go looking for the gossip. If you have one of those news aggregate programs on your computer or smartphone, you're likely to have a story about Gisele Bündchen's post-Tom Brady exploits thrown at you right next to a story about the Jan. 6 Committee's report.

It likely won't surprise anyone that a journalist like me would be a news junkie. I've been known to subscribe to a few newspapers and magazines beyond my own, and I follow several more on Apple's News platform — which tends to jumble them all up a bit. As I'm writing, the "content generators" at Apple News have placed a story about U.S. sanctions on companies doing illicit business with North Korea right next to a piece about what Dua Lipa wore during Paris Fashion Week.

Joke's on them — I'm probably dating myself here, but I didn't even know who Dua Lipa is. (And you thought these platforms were "curated" based on your interests.)

But thanks to Apple, if I wanted to know what she wore to a fashion show on another continent, I could find out.

Imagine if, with just the click of a mouse, the whole world could see what you wore to drop the kids off at school last week. Or that people actually cared.

Clearly the powers behind these information portals are banking on the public's interest in celebrities. That's not a new thing; we've always been fascinated by the rich and famous. It was common knowledge in the industry that a women's magazine cover featuring Princess Diana or Michelle Obama would outsell most others. Trouble was, you couldn't really put them on the cover of every issue.

But the advent of social media has shoved this obsession into overdrive. And now "content" (a term I personally loathe) about celebrities has gotten more and more contrived — to the point of absurdity.

So one could be forgiven for wondering why, in that environment, a guy who claimed he wanted to be left alone would drop a book called "Spare" about his famous family.

Especially since, as his mother's experiences proved, the British celebrity gossip machine in particular has an unquenchable appetite for devouring anyone with name recognition. I remember once seeing an article in a British paper that castigated a woman who'd become famous for being married to someone famous-er (he was the prime minister at the time) for committing the unpardonable sin of wearing silver jewelry.

Or maybe he's not so bothered by the attention after all. And if that's the case, his strategy worked.

Because, it seems, the machine has found a way to produce "content" without actually making contact. Can't get to Harry and Meghan themselves? No problem. Get a "body language expert" to analyze photos and videos, and interpret their relationship.

Believe it or not, these "body language" stories have appeared everywhere, from upstart websites to Newsweek. That's just a little bit creepy.

(Wonder how an expert would have interpreted my body language that time I tripped over the uneven pavement while I was walking the dog … but I digress.)

And if having somebody try to figure you out by your "body language" isn't intrusive enough, here's another morsel that appeared in my "feed" this week:

"Princess Diana's Astrologer Predicts Meghan Markle's 'Fighting Spirit' Will Be on Display at King Charles III's Coronation."

I mean seriously, who knows you better than your late mother-in-law's astrologer?

There really are three forces at play here: the celebrities themselves, the opportunists who make money from exploiting that celebrity and the folks who consume the gossip, creating the market in the first place.

Of the last two, which feeds the beast the most?

The travails of Meghan and Harry or Tom and Gisele or any Kardashian probably don't affect most people's lives much. So wouldn't it be better if we would just get on with our own lives, and they would get on with theirs?

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Fame has its price. In the age of social media, nothing is private.