• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, June 18, 2012

Omar Epps is a great actor. And having starred in the Fox’s high-rated “House” series, he is also a celebrity, but he says he’s not a brand. And that’s a good thing. Speaking during Sapient Nitro’s session during the Festival of Creativity in Cannes, France, Epps said, “Believe it or not, celebs are human beings and brands are just companies.”

As a result, Epps says celebrities will always dominate social media in a way that company brands cannot, mainly because social media is primarily about, well, human beings.

To illustrate this point, Epps recalled the social media stunt mounted by the Oreo brand to set a new Guiness record for the most Facebook likes in a 24-hour period. Epps said that when rapper Little Wayne got wind of the Oreo effort, he drew on his own social media legions to ambush Oreo’s effort, and the results was: Oreo = 100,000 likes; Little Wayne = 600,000 likes.