Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: blogging, fakeawish, farrah, goldblum, Media, michael jackson, social networking
I was at the beach yesterday, so I found out some interesting news second-hand, through a series of text messages and phone calls, some true and some not.
1. Michael Jackson is dead. I heard about this pretty early, from Heather, a friend of mine in WV. She was irritated that the news was released before it was actually confirmed. The story is sad though; he was a musical genius and beloved by so many people of so many ages. I was a big MJ fan, from ‘Off the Wall’ until he made ‘Dangerous,’ (Rolling Stone, 2009). This is around the time he started to really weird-out and became less an artist who made news, and more of eclectic multi-millionaire who also made a little music from time to time. I prefer to remember MJ as he was at his best (and this picture was on my wall, so it holds a special place in my heart.) He will be missed.
(Retrieval info below.)
2. Farrah Fawcett has also passed away. This I heard over the phone from my boyfriend’s dad that this had happened. I liked Charlie’s Angels and also recall watching her in a few made for TV movies, as well as being shocked by The Burning Bed. It was the first I had ever heard of domestic violence (and admittedly, it made me scared to get married, well until my mom explained the movie to me.) It appears that NBC aired an hour-long special on her last night, “Farrah Fawcett: The Life and Death of an Angel,” and will air “Farrah’s Story” which is a two-hour documentary which she filmed herself on her struggles over the last 2.5 years with cancer, (NBC.com, 2009). Quite an interesting take on cancer and how it ravages the body and soul, this is something I would watch. On a side note, when I did a search on Farrah Fawcett, before I hit enter in the Google search box, one of the suggestions that popped up was ‘Farrah Fawcett Playboy Images.” I guess there are people out there who wish to remember her in a different way. I choose this one; goodbye Farrah.
(Retrieval info below.)
3. While talking to my friend Sami in Tacoma about the news of day, she echoed Heather’s irritation that the ‘news’ was released before it was actually confirmed. I told her that from what I have learned in this term that this is how we will be getting our news in the future; from a number of unconfirmed reports and half truths which we will then need to sift through in order to find the truth. She seemed incredulous and I told her it’s as easy as someone among the first responders texting the news to a friend, who then puts it on twitter, where it gets picked up and posted either to a blog or to iReport. From there, the newshounds then pick up so many of these stories that they take further verification measures and release the news. This news was so hot yesterday that my BF wasn’t able to access cnn.com on his mobile because the servers were bogged down!
Well, oddly enough, Sami also mentioned that she heard that Jeff Goldblum was dead. He is not, but it took awhile to find out from where this ‘news’ came. It seems that there’s a site, FakeAWish.com, which “generates fake news stories reporting the death of celebrities when their names are entered,” (SBS, 2009). Why does this site exist? Who in the world has this much time that they created this fake news site? How can this ridiculousness be stopped?
Here’s some real news that I can be sure is true…the aforementioned Heather is pregnant! However, I heard about this from my sister, who saw it on Heather’s MySpace page, before it was confirmed by Heather herself! That’s social networking for you. Regardless…Congrats Heather and Corey!
References:
Farrah Fawcett Photo. (2009). Retrieved June 26 from http://photos.ecanadanow.com/farrah-fawcett-Anal-Cancer.jpg
Michael Jackson Photo. (2009). Retrieved June 26, 2009 from http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Kb4mTDJLT6c/Ry95xUYev1I/AAAAAAAAAJQ/bGVCBLja-54/s400/michael-jackson-thriller.jpg
NBC.com. (2009). “Farrah Fawcett: The Life and Death of an Angel to Air Tonight.” Retrieved June 26, 2009 from http://www.nbc.com/news/2009/06/25/farrah-fawcett-the-life-and-death-of-an-angel-to-air-tonight/
Rolling Stone. (2009). “Michael Jackson Discography.” Retreived June 26, 2009 from http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/michaeljackson/discography
SBS. (2009). “Goldblum ‘Dead’ in Online Hoax.” World News Australia. Retrieved June 26, 2009 from http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1033981/Goldblum-’dead’-in-online-hoax
