“I fly like paper, get high like planes. If you catch me at the border, I got visas in my name. If you come around here, I make ‘em all day. I get one down in a second if you wait.”    “Paper Planes” was released on M.I.A.’s second album, “Kala,” in August 2007. But it wasn’t until a year later the song made it onto the Billboard Top 100.Vampire Weekend released “A-Punk” on their self-titled debut album in January of this year. But the song didn’t become popular until July.The reason for these delays is the same reason many songs become popular long after they have been released.The opening credits of Will Ferrell’s “Step Brothers,” which was released July 25, featured “A-Punk.” And “Paper Planes” was featured in the trailer for “Pineapple Express,” which was released Aug. 6.While both of these songs and artists have been popular among underground music listeners for a while, being recently featured in major motion pictures boosted artists, especially M.I.A., into the mainstream.Now every time I get on Facebook, at least one of my friend’s statuses says they are flying like paper and getting high like planes. And I don’t think a day goes by that “Paper Planes” isn’t played at least a few times on the popular radio stations.A few weeks ago, I was searching for a new ringtone to download when I came across the “Pineapple Express” theme song. I had never heard of a theme song for the movie, so I clicked only to find “Paper Planes.” There is no “Pineapple Express” theme song. “Paper Planes” was not even on the soundtrack for the movie. It was only played in the trailer, and it seems the song and movie have become forever linked. A friend recently told me about a conversation she had with one of her classmates who was listening to “Paper Planes” on her iPod. They began talking about M.I.A. and how they both liked her music.My friend was an M.I.A. fan long before the masses, and she let her classmate know it. When she asked the girl how long she had been a fan of M.I.A., she defensively replied that she was the first person she knew to see “Pineapple Express.”M.I.A.’s first album, “Arular,” was released in 2005. And true M.I.A. fans have been listening from the beginning.This isn’t a new trend. An old-school example of the same thing happened with Phantom Planet’s “California,” which will forever be known as the theme song for “The O.C.” “California” was released on Phantom Planet’s third album, “The Guest,” which was released in February 2002. “The O.C.” premiered a year later in August 2003.Every Tuesday or Wednesday night, teenage girls across America would jump with excitement when they heard the first five notes of the piano in “California.”When Phantom Planet performed at Voodoo Festival in 2004, I was one of the teenage girls singing her heart out, fantasizing about reading comic books with Seth Cohen and Captain Oats, his toy horse. It’s not just knowing of an artist before someone else that makes someone a real fan. But people downloading one song by an artist whom they never would have known of unless they were featured in a movie or on television do not constitute dedicated fans in my opinion.     Can people really consider themselves true fans of a singer or band if they have only one song from the artist they claim to love?Could all the students that blast “Paper Planes” from their cars tell you M.I.A. recently released a fashion line? Or that she is currently expecting a child?  Could all the students walking to class jamming to “A-Punk” on their iPods tell you that the band is named after a film that the lead singer created in which he was fighting off vampires to protect his virginity? I highly doubt it.Jumping on the bandwagon and liking an artist just because they’re popular doesn’t make a real fan. And people that do this should not claim to be fans.Believe it or not, some people listen to artists before their songs are featured in movies or television shows, and usually those are the true fans.    —-Contact Victoria Toups at  [email protected]