AP gets Britney's obit ready

WHAT THE???

 

I've read that some publications -- be they dailies or wire services -- have started adding video interviews of people whose obits are being prewritten. The idea is to interview them while they are alive, with full knowledge that it will be used after their demise, to give them the opportunity to dicuss their lives, the ups and downs.

As for obit preparedness, it is a fact of the business and the files are, I imagine, quite numerous.

 

Without reading thru the entire thread, this was the first thing I thought of, too.
When did this sort of thing become "news"/
US magazine and AP really served up a stinker by doing this.

 

US readers will eat this up though, blitz. I should know, I used to be one.

 

There's no doubt about it.

 

The New York Times has started doing this. It was kinda creepy to see Art Buchwald on video: "If you're watching this, I'm dead," or something along those lines. He was in good spirits about it, but still.

I also read somewhere that the Times has approached some past presidents about recording some videos in preparation of their obits. Story said one ex-prez took part and one declined. The two that come to mind would be Bush and Carter. I think Carter did his and Bush said no.

 

Amen

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20172512,00.html

 

And on a related note, this link on that page:

Next stop for Lindsay Lohan: The morgue

(OK, not really. But still...)

 

Not wishingn anything on anyone, but the premature deaths of Spears, Lohan and Paris Hilton will bring to an end the obnoxious celebrity epoch, like the deaths of Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix signaled the end of the hippie Sixties.

 

Can't believe this kid wouldn't be better served if she just went back to Louisiana and we left her alone.

 

As to Double D's question.
In terms of relevance, I'd argue that Marilyn because people still talk about her fifty years later. I suppose that Britney will be forgotten in 50 years, or barely remembered as a minor character. But it also depends on how she dies. If it is something truely spectacular and maybe taking her kids with her, then it might be something.

Jesse Washington revised
"As the world's largest newsgathering organization AP has a responsibility to be prepared. As a matter of course, we maintain files on all notable celebrities in the case of their untimely deaths. We do not comment on any one specific person, but I can conform that Britney Spears does have a file, along with several hundred other notable people."