Of all the product tie-ins Apple never approved, getting an iPod for predicting a death has got to be the worst.
Cynical journos have long had newsroom betting pools on when public figures would meet their makers but website whenwillamywinehousedie.com brought that gallows recreation to the Internet public back in 2007.
The prize? An iPod Touch.
“Since we launched this site we’ve had hundreds of thousands of hits, 237 hate mails telling us we’re the devil in disguise and 96,026 people who left their predictions,” reads a note posted on the site two days after Winehouse’s death. “Out of all those entries only 4 were correct. The first person to do so did it on December 21st 2007 and we’ve called her the winner of the iPod Touch. We will be contacting her via email.”
The bare-bones site features pics of the singer at her most disheveled and out-of-sorts along with a form inciting readers to “use the form to guess Amy’s final breath and be crowned Mr. Or Mrs. Death.”
The thinking behind the macabre game?
According to the anonymous site makers: “We’ll all have a date with our maker someday, but Amy Winehouse just can’t seem to wait. She can write and sing a beautiful tune, but for some reason Amy has landed in a self-destruction derby…Guess her final breath and be crowned Mr. Or Mrs. Death. Winner will be rewarded with a iPod Touch.”
