Over the last few weeks, we lost Roger Ebert and Margaret Thatcher.

The news breaks, and within minutes, articles about, “What We Can Learn from So-and-So” are pushed to my inbox and flooding my social feeds.

I can’t help but have this image in my head…
A heaping pile of articles on leaders and celebs are drafted and ready to go. Edits are made here and there as they keep living their lives, but they’re waiting for them to die. Waiting for the moment they can hit the publish button, be the first to break the news and have us “learn something” from the recently deceased.

Anyone else bothered by this?

What kind of thoughts are going through these writers heads… 
“Can’t wait for J. K. Rowling to keel over, ‘cuz this headline is GOLD!”

I understand the power of being “first” but what does it really say?

It definitely makes the whole, “For Immediate Release” very uncomfortable and just plain weird.