I had a big ‘Oh wow’ moment on Saturday when I went to get the mail out of my mailbox. Mixed in with the usual blend of credit card offers (yes, I’m still getting them), catalogs and bills was the latest issue of Time magazine. Pictured on the cover was the large, signature photograph of FDR – and the headline, “What Barack Obama Can Learn from FDR.’
That cover was glaring proof that traditional news coverage is gasping for air.
What I knew and what the world’s citizens had been incredulously mourning, discussing and rehashing was the fact that Michael Jackson was dead. He died last Thursday. His passing was so passionately felt by so many that the millions upon millions upon millions of mentions of his name almost crashed the internet.
Social sites like Twitter and Facebook slowed to a crawl. Google interpreted the huge spike in Michael Jackson queries as an attack on its services. AOL’s instant messenger service went down for 40 minutes due to the heavy load. Yet, here in my hands I held –hot off the press- one of our nation’s foremost news magazines without a mention of the King of Pop’s passing.