Richie Death Hoax

http://en.mediamass.net/people/richi...deathhoax.html

Granted, I've been sick the past few days, but I haven't seen ONE WORD about this on Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo... am I living under a rock? LOL

It's a satire site. It has other goofy articles about Richie and other celebs.

There was no hoax at all. The first anyone heard about it is now with this article denying it. The whole thing was made up.

Mediamass should be called MediaMESS. It isn't worthy of being called a satire site -- it isn't even worthy of being called an EMBARRASSINGLY BAD satire site.

Satire is NOT about making something up and hoping that someone thinks it's funny. Proper satire takes a spoonful of irony or inconvenient truth and bakes it into a three-tiered cake with frosting. But because it has the potential to be lethal, satire (like automatic weapons and guitar feedback) works best when handled by trained, experienced professionals.

Here are examples of good online satire, courtesy of The Onion.com and The Borowitz Report:

Cheney Marks Tenth Anniversary of Pretending There Was A Reason To Invade Irag

Kids In 'Scared-Straight' Program Visit Horrifying Cleveland Cavaliers Practice

Obama Blasts Obama's Evasive Stance On Gay Marriage

New Breeding Program Aimed At Keeping Moderate Republicans From Going Extinct

Bon Jovi Start 30th Anniversary Tour By Renewing Their Same-Sexless Marriage Vows

Richie Sambora Orders Removal Of Segregated Checkout Lines From His White Trash Beautiful Clothing Stores

Okay, I made up the last two -- but I did so satirically!

I happened upon that 'satire' site for the first time today, when I saw a post on Tumblr that said Richie was chosen as Glamour Magazine's 'Sexiest Guitarist of 2013.' For about 2 minutes, I believed it; then I saw the other stories and read more about the site, and well, so much for that.

Took you 2 whole minutes?

Lol actually, my mind was more on images like this:

Seeing as Glamour is a beauty/fashion magazine, and 2013 is barely three months old, two minutes sounds fair!

Well, and also, he /does/ look good this year--much better than in 2010 and before. I hope he keeps it up.

If people are so naive as to believe everything they hear on Facebook, instead of doing their own research to verify the claims, then I don't really care how distressed and angry they get. Maybe they won't be so sucked in next time.