Photo: Hot Gossip Italia, flickr.
Millions were saddened today to learn of the apparent death of musician, actress, and freakshow spectacle Miley Cyrus, via a written story by Christopher Hooton in the British national newspaper The Independent.
Hooton’s article, “Charting the decline of ‘BREAKING NEWS’,” bemoans the increasing emptiness of the term, given persistent media efforts “to drum up interest in tedious ongoing stories.” His opening paragraph mentions that the spectacular death of Cyrus is perhaps the only celebrity-orientated story that would truly qualify as ‘BREAKING NEWS’.
Sadly, the criminally short attention span of the reading public and their media-induced tendency to focus on alarming soundbites and juicy quotes resulted in a tragic misunderstanding. Subsequently, millions were saddened to learn that the death of Cyrus was not a hoax, but a simple misunderstanding in interpreting the Hooten story. As it turns out, Cyrus did not light herself on fire and run into a fireworks factory, killing 75 people, however, Hooten surmises that if this did happen, it would qualify as ‘BREAKING NEWS’.
The irony that his outrageous proclamation served to drum up interest in his editorial—an arguably tedious story—seemed completely lost on Hooton.