His death on June 25 was first reported as a rumor on the celebrity-sniffing site, TMZ. Later it became a fact. Shock waves and rumblings spread across oceans and continents in tsunamic time and at Richter scale depths, spawning an emotional tumult which virtually shut down huge chunks of Internet real estate as reactions, queries and emotional gapes careened through cyberspace and dotted news crawls.
The landscape of American pop culture was permanently changed, its fabric rent.
In a week of major events ranging from U.S. troops withdrawing in Iraq to Sarah Palin's surprising decision to step down as Alaska's governor, Michael Jackson's attention-swallowing death became the media narrative from June 29 through July 8th.
According to Tom Rosensteil, Director of Project for Excellence in Journalism at The Pew Research Center, this entire skein of Jackson-related coverage has largely been a television story. It accounted for 30% of the airtime on network news and 28% on cable news last week.
Over 31 million watched the memorial coverage on TV in the US. Internet and world viewing figures are still undetermined as of this writing; but it was already a larger audience than watched the Obama inauguration and the Ronald Reagan funeral. More than six 6 million reportedly watched it on the "telly" in England.
The U.S. TV audience for Princess Diana's 1997 funeral, was 33.2 million people in the (we do love our royalty, don't we. First a princess, now a King. Presidents... not so much).
The Di affair retains the record for the most watched memorial in the history of television. But the Internet was not a popular audience destination back then so we must await those figures to fully assess the scope of Jackson's draw. He may yet become the leader of the pack.
The overarching fact of this Michael Jackson attention bubble was that the man and the myth were everywhere. Suddenly and once again, the media was all Michael all the time -- Klieg lights in cyberspace and beyond.
Proportion and the eye of the beholder
Was this just too much? A gross misordering of priorities? In the matter of Michael Jackson's death, was the media orgy of patter, pictures, pundits and pontification a tasteless, graceless and verbose affair? Just a chase for eyeballs?
After all, did the world actually stop turning, events stop happening, soldiers stop dying, Islamic civilians stop being eviscerated, the climate stop warming when Jackson's music died? Did the Pop King warrant such media attention?
How one answers that question may partly depend on how one feels about the "King of Pop." Take Republican Rep. Peter King of New York (please...) for example. 
He uploaded a vicious, politically-tinged video rant about the ridiculous amount of attention the media paid to Jackson-the pervert. So much more could and should have been paid to police, soldiers, firemen, people who are the true heroes of society, he pleaded.
Congressman King's rant was opportunistic, directed to his constituency, which is largely values-conservative. But his wasn't the only voice railing against the seeming excess of media coverage. True, much of this outrage was paraded (surprise) on FoxNews. But more than a few people I talked to felt that media respect for Michael glided into media exploitation of Michael. This included a symphony conductor with whom I play poker who was also irked that to find real news coverage he had to tune in to The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer sporting a tired, blander format than the maestro's spicy news tastes dictated.
As for cable news, there was no safe port in the Jackson storm. I think that Larry King ran Jackson reminiscences and an anatomies of his neuroses five nights in a row.
Was all this, then, really, too much Jackson coverage?
According to whom? If the media had Michael Tunnel Vision, so, apparently, as cable ratings indicated, did its audiences.
I am reminded of what I once heard described as the recovering alcoholic's dilemma: one drink is too much and 100 are not enough. How might this apply to the "lost weekend" of our nation's Michael Jackson fan and media bender? It goes like this:
If you dislike Michael Jackson and do so because:
he's Black,
he's not Black anymore,
he has mixed-race children,
he was accused of molesting children, (never convicted)
accused of possessing child pornography(never convicted)
he was a weirdo, freak (guilty as charged),
then even one program devoted to celebrating his legend and legacy may be too much. (Culture warriors are an unforgiving lot.)
However, if you adored Michael Jackson and/or his legacy, because you
grew up with Michael,
considered him a genius,
followed and wept over his joys and his disasters,
were bemused but finally "understanding" of his
odd paternity quests
his odder physical and emotional whirlpools,like his Peter Pan Syndrome,
then 100 programs devoted to him are not enough.
And, if you either wanted to be "Bad" or be Billie Jean,
as one woman who stalked him and proclaimed she bore his love child did, if a part of you died when Michael did, this memorial to him was just what the doctor ordered.
A Memorial, or a Tasteless exhibition?
Beyond media coverage, though, was Michael's memorial at the Staples center just too much, as FoxNews chatter and viewer comments would assert?
Why not just a church?
Why engage the world?
Didn't his family have any sense of privacy?
Why make a circus out of it?
The answer I would offer is this:
First. It wasn't a circus. If you think it was, you didn't watch it. Precautions and sensibilities prevented that.
Second, Michael Jackson was a world-renowned superstar who lived large and lavishly and controversially. He existed on a personal life stage and was nourished by audiences, by their awe and admiration at his gifts.
Michael craved both the public and the private life spaces.
Michael would have wanted that at a memorial. His fans deserved all he could give.
Michael's family knew that and wanted the memorial to reflect that.
In Hollywood, that's the way things are done.
In Hollywood culture, the bigger the star, the bigger the venue for celebrations,memorials, performances and retrospectives.
Diversity
Finally, there is this: Who is to say what is fitting, what is proper, what is tasteful, what is tasteless, what should be public and what should remain private?
Do we presume to condemn cultures that celebrate death in the same ways they celebrate life, should we open doors to straight jackets of emotional correctness?
Do we ask the revelers to stop dancing and moving at a New Orleans jazz funeral dance march?
Do we ask the Irish to "behave themselves," exercise more restraint and decorum at funerals and wakes?
Do we criticize Mexicans for their colorful, emotional extravagances and skeletal notes of irreverence on the Day of the Dead?
Do we ask the Danes or Swedes in Minnesota to show a bit more emotion and a bit less rectitude on emotionally crushing occasions?
American culture is nothing if not diverse. So, a memorial at Staples Center!? Yes, yes, and again, yes! That's the culture of Michael Jackson and the Jackson family and the world in which they resided and performed. By all accounts and Nielsen ratings, that's exactly what his friends and fans wanted-more time to celebrate the legend and more time to collectively remember, share and mourn the man.
Michael's death transfigured the man-child. He became the communal wafer of which the world literally partook at the ceremony that relished and consumed his legend and legacy.
Michael Jackson's memorial service was attended by the world! And why not? When stars die the heavens grow a little darker.
