LOS ANGELES (LALATE) – Snoop Dogg is not dead. In fact, Snoop Dogg fake death reports surfaced online just weeks ago, prompted massive fan confusion. Today, the same false reports that Snoop has died are back. It remains unclear if the source of today’s reports is any different than the source of recent reports. But Snoop Dogg is definitely not dead and fans are furious.
Just days ago, fake Snoop Dogg death reports angered fans and confused others. Snoop Dogg was the victim of a still prevalent trend of confusing music fans via posts on Twitter or Facebook. Since fake celebrity death reports first came to prevalence several years ago, the overriding subjects of those reports have been musicians, namely rappers or hip-hop artists. Last year, a fake death story about Lil Wayne seemed to be a monthly, even not weekly, occurrence.
And yet, fans seem if these reports are targeted or random. To date, several top hip-hop artists like Lil Wayne and Eminem have been the subject of such reports, repeatedly, while other artists of the same genre, of comparable popularity, have never been the subject of such reports.
Fake death reports sometimes have a direct timing to them, other times they do not. For example, Jackie Chan death reports often circulate just as the actor is the subject of movie news. Fake celebrity death reports sometimes draw immediate skepticism while others sometimes draw confusion.
“No Snoop Dogg is not dead. I wish people would stop saying that” said one fan on Twitter moments ago. “Is Snoop Dogg really dead? I need to know because that was my main man” said one confused fan within the hour, referencing the rapper in the past, not present, tense.
While Twitter, Facebook and Twitpic have been the source of spreading such false reports, since summer 2011 the means and methods have definitely changed. Some persons have gone out of their way to create entire websites, often entire social networking pages, to announce false news about a celebrity’s death. Sometimes they steal the template, logos, even brand name from other companies to confuse readers. In one recent case, a fake celebrity death story was passed off as true news; the author stole a national cable news channel’s logo, inserted the singer’s face, and claimed she had been confirmed dead (which she wasn’t).
But when a rapper like Snoop Dogg is reported falsely dead earlier in the month, that same report remains online indefinitely; so when questions resurface today, people are exposed to the same false report that tricked other fans just weeks ago. “Musician, Snoop Dogg was believed to have been a passenger on the flight” claimed one false report earlier this month. The report remains online today.
Snoop Dogg is not dead, nor is Jackie Chan. Snoop didn’t die in a plane crash, car crash, or train crash. Nor did he perish snowboarding in the Swiss Alps or hiking in Peru.
