Share your thoughts on the display of Michael Jackson’s obituary
Post-Dispatch
Los Angeles Times
Was Michael Jackson’s death worth front-page display in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch? For editors yesterday, the answer was clearly yes.
But how much display was appropriate? News of his death arrived late afternoon. (Bob Rose will be posting a separate blog item on our wait for confirmation before posting the news on STLtoday.com.) So few readers of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch this morning read the obituary as a “news” item. We selected a New York Times article by Brooks Barnes that we thought provided context and depth about the life of Jackson.
We decided to display our strongest local story — about the police towing scandal — at the top of the page and place Jackson’s photo and obituary between two other local stories — mid-page but above the fold. We know that readers of the Post-Dispatch can get national and world news from many other sources — online, on TV, on radio. So we strive to be the area’s top source for local news, and to prominently display news that readers aren’t getting elsewhere. The Post-Dispatch was the first to break the towing scandal and has led in reporting subsequent developments.
When obituaries are displayed on Page One, it’s usually to mark the historic nature of the person. Jackson seems to clearly qualify. Barnes’ article likened his role in the world of music to Elvis and the Beatles.
A few colleagues today have suggested that Jackson’s obituary should have led the page.
Many newspapers — the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and the Washington Post — played Jackson’s death at the top of their fronts. A scroll through Today’s Front Pages on the web site newseum.org shows many papers displayed Jackson’s death more prominently than the Post-Dispatch.
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Steve Parker is the deputy managing editor for news, and oversees the Post-Dispatch's front page. STLtoday's online news editors are on his newsroom team. Parker has been at the paper since September 1980. 
13 year old boys everywhere breathed a sigh of relief yesterday
People need to get over themselves. The man was a legend no matter what people say he did…He was acquitted, leave it alone and let the man rest in peace.
Michael is finally resting.
And may God keep him from now until forever eternally. He had many of our hearts and many who truly believed in himu as a decent and good human being. One day everything will be exposed and brought into the light for all to see and I believe at that time he will finally be justified by the Justifier God Himself. I thank God for Michael who brought to so many in this world much joy through that miraculous gift of his that will live on until the end of this age. I have loved Michael Jackson like so many others from the time when he first appeared on the scene of the entertainment world.
When I was a little bitty child about seven or eight, he was the guy that I thought I was going to marry, I imagined. (lol).
Yes, he deserved to be displayed exactly where he was located, front page display.
Tiffany, I’ll agree the man was a legend and will be seen that way. His musical legacy is great and will be viewed that way. Unfortunately his personal legacy was not so great. Just because OJ and Michael have more money than God and can hire the best sleaze bag defense lawyers money can buy to get them acquited on technicalities does not mean they are/were truly inncocent.
Michael who?
I don’t think the coverage of Jackson’s death was overdone. But I have to tell you, I have seen some outrageous reactions to the news of his death. I was in a grocery store yesterday evening when I overhead the checker and the man in line in front of me discussing Jackson’s death. At one point, the checker pumped her fist as if to celebrate. Disgusting! I was not a Michael Jackson fan, but I wanted to ask the checker what he ever did to her that would make her so happy to learn he had died. Some of the jokes I’m hearing today are pretty distateful. Michael Jackson was a screwy character and he was ACCUSED of some bad things. But he was not the villain some people want to make of him.
Susan who??????
No matter what he was personally, which was a flawed human being with demons (since WE are all perfect!), he was a creative genius in the music and entertainment world. The man may now rest in peace.
D.Walker-Looks like a slow work day for you at US Fidilishy.
The newspaper headlines about Michael Jackson’s death says volumes about what we think is worthwhile news now. It’s nearly incomprehensible to think, that in my lifetime, I would live to see every major local and national news media cover the death of an aging pedophile, former pop celebrity, as if he was a head of state.
Real news doesn’t matter anymore. What Lenny Bruce once said of Las Vegas, can now be said of our sorry U.S. news now — it’s nothing but t. & a.