Celebrity Death Rumors Spawned by Internet

By Ann Hunter on October 22, 2009

Weirdly gay blogger Perez Hilton caused a stir recently after falsely reporting that actress Jacqueline Smith suffered a gunshot wound to the head. Hilton hasn’t bothered to apologize to Smith.

Perez’s online mishap comes on the heels of gossip site TMZ reporting then quickly pulling a story about the hospitalization of Maya Angelou. TMZ made the mistake after incorrectly reporting the death of UFC figher Kimo Leopoldo. The site, Huffington Post, was also quick to repost the false Kimo story.

Before that ugly incident, Jeff Goldblum was wrongly reported to have died in an accident in New Zealand and the “news” was leaked on the Internet.

The latest rash of death rumors is coming virally from social networks where random people are reporting the death of Kanye West.

West’s girlfriend and former stripper, Amber Rose, is not happy about the morbid rumor saying:

"This 'RIP Kanye West' topic is not funny and it's not true! It's in extreme poor taste to have that as a trendy topic. It's totally disrespectful to make up a story like this we're all human ... and we all make mistakes and to say someone died cuz of a mistake is ridiculous. You wouldn't want someone to say that about you."

Rose was referring to Kanye’s music award mishap involving Taylor Swift.

While the rumors are not fun for celebrities and their family, it’s also reeking havoc with the Celebrity Death Pool.