Twitter trend: RIP Cher, but is it real?
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On Thursday night, two popular reality stars got tied up in a rumor that gay icon, Cher, had died.
“RIP Cher” was trending on Twitter late in the night through early Friday morning, but it appears that Cher is just the latest celebrity to fall victim to a false death as the result of internet trends.
Evidently a user created a false Tweet on the microblogging site that appeared to have originated from CNN”s account.
The fake message read,”American recording artist Cher dies at 65 years old. Found dead in Malibu home.”
After reading the message or seeing that “RIP Cher” was trending, Kim Kardashian and “Millionaire Matchmaker” Patti Stanger both got wrapped up in the drama.
“Did I just hear Cher has passed away? Is this real? OMG” tweeted Kardashian.
To which Stanger replied, “Is this for real? I don’t see it anywhere.”
Kardashian followed up with: “I hope this is a twitter joke and not true. I don’t see it on the news anywhere. I’m praying its not true…”
Cher, who is normally a fixture on Twitter, didn’t set the record straight herself. However, her good friend Loree Rodkin cleared up the rumors by tweeting, “It’s a hoax. She’s fine.”
Cher isn’t the first celebrity to suffer a false death on the web. Justin Beiber, Jim Carey and others have all fallen victim to the rumor that they were dead after trends spiked on search engines and social networking sites.
About Charles Winters
Charles Winters is the Chief Executive Officer and Editorial Director for our parent company (his namesake, Charles Winters Information Management) where he oversees such media outlets as GaySocialites.com, queerplanet.net, CouponAngel.us and FiDiNYC.info. He founded GaySocialites.com in 2005 and served as Editor-in-Chief until 2011. He still contributes to GaySocialites.com by regularly reporting news, penning a weekly op-ed piece and hosting our original television/ radio programs titled "GaySocialites.com presents..."
