Initial confusion about the death of "The Fast and the Furious" actor Paul Walker centers around news of death hoax by a website that admittedly makes up stories about celebrities to poke fun at the media.
Death hoax an untimely joke
In a strange twist of events, even though the initial report of the death hoax was fictitious, the death of Paul Walker on Saturday was real.
Mediamass is the website at the center of the confusion, as it ran a fictitious story on a Paul Walker death hoax the day before Walker died.
The original article on the MediaMass website about the Paul Walker death hoax was been taken down and replaced with a short statement simply reporting that Paul Walker is dead.
Mediamass describes itself as, "the medium of our satire to expose with humor, exaggeration and ridicule the contemporary mass production and mass consumption that we observe."
Running fictitious stories about celebrities is part of how the site describes itself, "The ‘People’ section is a humorous parody of Gossip magazines, all stories are obviously not true."
The death hoax the day before Paul Walker’s death was the product of a parody website attempting to be funny.
Death rumors nothing new
Reports of celebrity deaths are nothing new in the world of social media. In recent years the website Snopes has been busy dispelling false statements about celebrities deaths. Snopes is a well noted website for finding the truth behind urban legends and internet rumors.
Snopes has reported on many false rumors on the death of actor Jackie Chan , wrestler John Cena , and Bill Nye The Science Guy .
The power of the internet
Sadly, the story becomes as much about the power of the internet, as it is about an young actor who died in a tragic accident.
Check out, "The Paul Walker death hoax confusion and the power of the internet"
Follow us on social media as we continue our quest in understanding the great power and responsibility of the internet. Look for Tom Peracchio on the net ... The Guru 42 Blog , @Gu42 on Twitter , Guru42 on Google+ or Guru42 on Facebook
via Examiner National Edition Gadgets & Tech Channel Articles http://www.examiner.com/article/paul-walker-s-death-and-the-internet-hoax-that-never-happened?cid=roadrunner