Fans, copy-editors struggle with news of REM split
Fans coming to terms with the announcement that influential American rock band REM are to split are joined in their misery by copy-editors frantic to avoid using the obvious ‘It’s the end of the world as we know it’ in their articles – unless of course, nobody else has.
‘It’s the elephant in the room, it’s so tempting, but if 50 other news sources do it, you just look like an arse.” croaked one weary hack, who eventually went with ‘Everybody Hurts as REM announce split’, as did 50 other news sources.
Long term REM fan Ian Broomfield, 40, expressed his sadness at the announcement, saying, ‘I grew up with these guys, through my teens, through college and beyond. It’s the end of…an era. For me, this is worse than when Amy Winehouse died.’
Echoing that fan’s feelings, a copy-editor for an on-line media entity agreed that deciding whether the ‘They tried to make her go to rehab…’ line was really clever or just really trite was the most distressing experience he’d had since announcing Kurt Cobain’s death with the misjudged headline ‘Oh Whatever, Never Mind’.
Tristan Shout
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Posted: Sep 22nd, 2011 by Guest
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