I’m currently reading Frank Bruni’s autobiography “Born Round.” As a foodie and long-time reader of his New York Times food reviews (which he stopped writing around the same time that his book was published), I was intrigued about Bruni’s background, and how he went from being stationed in the Times office in Rome covering politics to having the most influential job in the world of food critique (at least in New York City).
There is one chapter in his book where Bruni writes about his experience as an intern at Newsweek back when he was a college student. He recounts often joking around with one of his fellow interns who played into the “naïf girl” persona. Both interns were charged with, among other things, fact-checking and one day he decided to tell one of them something to the extent of “what do you make of Mary Taylor Moore’s death. I mean, I’m sure you’ve heard about it, right?”
Can you imagine what would have happened if that story had happened today in the world of blogs and instant news? I suppose that’s one of the ways rumors get started. Though in the same token, if that particular rumor got out of hand, it could have possibly been stopped had it happened today (i.e. perhaps the intern would have been more dubious if she had access to something like Google and came-up empty handed when doing a death search…). Similar tales seem to be appearing more and more, and the fashion world is certainly not immune.
