“Since his death was reported this morning, the top trending topics on Twitter have been ‘RIP Billy Mays’ followed by the product with which he was most closely associated, the stain remover OxiClean. (No. 3: the misspelling ‘OxyClean.’) One tweet notes, ‘He was the only human that was allowed to speak entirely in CAPS LOCK.’”

—NYTimes story on death of Billy Mays, third paragraph

If there’s one thing we’ve learned in the past week, it’s that Twitter’s lightning fast news distribution can’t be ignored by mainstream media. But really, New York Times? You’re going to cite Twitter’s trending topics and random tweets from users just two paragraphs from your lead? (A YouTube video of Mays’ commercial for “Kaboom” cleaner is sandwiched between the second and third paragraphs, I might add.)

Man, mainstream media are really getting desperate.