Rejoice! News Of The World is closing down!

Everyone in the UK (and their dogs) knows about this amazing news already, but for the benefit of Britney fans in other territories, I felt an overwhelming need to make an announcement.

No publication has worked harder to drag Britney Spears’ name through the mud than the UK’s leading Sunday tabloid “The News Of The World”. Well, the great news for Britney and her fans, and for countless other celebs around the world, is that the News Of The World is closing down! The final issue is today, Sunday 10th July, 2011!

The reasons believed to be behind the shut-down are: the growing avalanche of revelations about the tabloid’s illegal activity in allegedly authorising a private detective to hack into the voicemail on the phones of celebs, royalty, dead soldier’s families, terrorist victims, and even murdered schoolgirls, and in paying the Metropolitan Police for information. Chief Executive of parent company News International, Rebekah Brooks, has hinted to the NOTW staff who are about to lose their jobs that the inevitability of the closure will be obvious to them all in a few months’ time.

Some may think that these methods of obtaining information, and the use of entrapment by "fake sheiks" and other underhanded devices, may at least suggest an interest in getting to the truth. But media commentators have pointed out that what it really shows is an interest in lazy journalism and a disinclination to get out of the office, do the legwork and talk to some real people who might actually KNOW the truth about something. A quick look at a small sample of their Britney-related stories paints you a picture of vivid imaginations, wild speculation and simple disregard for their victims:

Britney Spears has flipped her lid in rehab, trying to hang herself with a bedsheet!
Britney Spears and Paris Hilton's lesbian fling?
Britney Spears has been working with an adoption agency and is planning on adopting 6 year old Chinese twins ...
Britney Spears Claims to be the Anti-Christ
Britney and Kevin: A Renewed Spark?
Paris Hilton loves the fact that Britney gets turned on by going commando
Britney Spears Islam Conversion For Adnan Ghalib Wedding
Britney has a master plan to get her kids back: Fake her own death.

If we were to go back over the last 10 years, we would find hundreds of dubious stories just like these.

I guess the demise of the paper known to many as “The News of the Screws” will come as a loss and a disappointment to some fans though. Amazingly, there are those who still see her time with Sam Lutfi as a kind of golden age, when there were Britney alarms and excursions, shocks and horrors to talk about every day. The “Free Britney from the Conservators” campaign yearns for those great times to return. But for those who say they don’t know Britney personally and ask why they should care about her - the so-called fans who describe themselves as “consumers” - the sad news is that it’s going to be a lot harder to “consume” Britney without the help of the News Of The World.

But here's the thing. Although the 200 staff are already suing for wrongful dismissal, there's little chance that they will really lose their jobs. News International has obviously decided that they can't just reopen the NOTW with a new name in a month or two, when the storm has blown over. As a legal entity, it has to be quarantined from the rest of the News International organisation. However, it's already rumored that News International won't simply roll over and hand the market to their rivals. An entirely new Sunday tabloid is guaranteed to be on its way. And you can guess who its staff will mostly be composed of, give or take a rotten apple or two!