All this for just 72 days of wedded bliss. (E!)

This past Friday, "Bachelorette" star Ashley Herbert announced that her December nuptials will be televised, adding herself to the list of starlets being wed in front of thousands of television viewers. Laurent Conrad also recently admitted that she would consider holding her wedding on television when the time came. Yes, Lauren Conrad has lived most of her life on television, and Ashley Herbert did have the country watching as she fell in love... yet one cannot help but wonder, what’s with the  recent TV wedding craze?

The answer seems fairly simple, really. Reality starlets are dying to stretch their 15 minutes of fame as far as they can. The first time we saw this was with Khloe Karadashian. Her on-screen wedding to Lamar Odom pulled in thousands of viewers and was really the first multi-hour wedding special viewers had ever seen. The popularity of Khloe’s wedding was certainly not lost on sister Kim, whose televised wedding pulled in over 2 million viewers, not to mention the countless magazine covers, stories, and television interviews that came along with a wedding viewed by the public. So it seems these televised weddings are a way for stars extend their time in the limelight, or in Ashley Herbert’s case to re-enter it. However these stars are probably thankful for the fans who helped make them famous, and want to share one of their biggest momens with all those who helped put them in the spotlight to begin with. So whether these stars are stretching their time in the limelight, or are sharing a personal moment with thousands of fans, we as viewers have fallen in love with televised weddings, and will certainly tuning in to see our favorite celebs walk down the aisle in the future.

This recent craze of televised weddings has extended far beyond the "wedding special", and even beyond the realm of celebrities. Everyday people are jumping at the chance to televise any, and/or all parts of their wedding, as we can see from the TLC shows “Four Weddings” and “Say Yes To The Dress”, the latter of which has accrued multiple seasons and an Atlanta-based spin-off. With little to gain from showing the emotionally exhausting process of picking a wedding dress, or the spectacle of having other women judge and rate your wedding, why do regular women subject themselves to a such an experience... on TV no less? It seems that these women are on the quest for that "fairytale wedding". They want to be just like Kim Kardashian, wearing a princess-like dress and a multi-million dollar ring. The closest they can come to that is broadbasting themselves picking out a dress. Every woman wants to feel like the center of attention on her wedding day. So if being on television is what it takes for some women to feel important on their special day, I say so be it - let her shine in whatever ways she feels necessary, even if that does mean having the world watch her bridal store breakdown.

Reach Staff Reporter Haylee Saathoff here.