Why do people all of a sudden care when a celebrity dies?

[Quietpark689]

I go all the way back to the 60s and they've been doing this since then. Take it all the way back to the 1920s when Rudolph Valentino died and all the hooplah over his death. So people aren't "suddenly" caring...they've been doing it for almost a century. Look at the insanity over Michael Jackson? While people were so busy mourning him, practically no one paid attention to Farrah Fawcett who died on the same day. Had Patrick Swayze died within two months of MJ, still no one would have noticed. Like the other answerer said, it depends on who's a favorite at the moment. People are fickle...but they make huge deals out of who is popular at the moment.