Yep, that was me. The Hunter Kelly rule. I’d imagine that Hunter would also fall under the “only famous because of illness” rule if it were added.
ETA: Hunter lived for about three years after I tried to pick him. No need to thank me, Jim.
How about this for a definition of celebrity: you can find a media story referencing them before their death, not counting stories about their serious illness and/or approaching death? Mentions in public records such as court documents or daily crime reports also would not count.
At least it’s simple – if they’ve been mentioned in the media before death, they are a celebrity.
You may wish to consider an honor system with a self-identification clause: If you personally hadn’t heard of the person before they became ill, don’t pick them.
Minor league hockey player in a coma? Fine, if you’re a minor league hockey fan and you knew who this guy was. But if the first you heard of him was when he hit his head on the ice–then lay off.
I think that’s too restrictive. There are lots of genuine celebrities who you and I have never heard of.
I think what he’s say, though, is if you haven’t heard of them, don’t pick them – even if they are in a coma.
Exactly–which is why it’s impossible to say that a given person either “is a celebrity” or “is not a celebrity”. If you heard of them (other than your friends or relatives) before they became sick, then they’re a celebrity to you. Go ahead and pick them.
If you didn’t hear of them until you googled “pancreatic cancer”, or until the news media reported that they were comatose, then don’t pick them–it’s not as much fun to play the game that way.
I’d dislike that - I’ve got three of my picks this year simply by going through a list of still-living Medal of Honor winners. I could pick one of them that has had a recent news story involving him. If you define recent as being within the past ten years.
To pick someone who got her fifteen minutes of fame relatively early - Baby Jessica, the girl who fell into the well - Is she still a celeb? Or does celebrity expire?
The reason I think the two sites would be too restrictive is because there are genuine celebrities whose deaths would not rate a mention outside their home country.
CNN and BBC sites both have no hits for “Colin Thiele”, the Australian author of several books that have been made into movies or tv series and who died on September 4, 2006 (his death may have been reported on a different day, perhaps, but some other Australian guy got killed by a stingray that day and hogged all the headlines). If the adaptations of his work are taken as a measure of success, then he is arguably more a celebrity (in Australia) than several US Sci-Fi authors whose deaths were reported on CNN/BBC.
Bob Barker, former host of The Price is Right, will inevitably have his obituary published by CNN when he dies. Ian Turpie and Larry Emdur, former hosts of The Price is Right (Australian edition), will not have their obituaries published by either source unless the deaths are newsworthy in their own right. While it’s true that Bob Barker is a valid pick for an Australian player, fewer Aussies have heard of him because his show doesn’t screen here (that I’m aware of).
Limiting the source to CNN and BBC would eliminate the Australian (and other foreign) equivalents of American celebrities who would be permitted. That doesn’t seem fair.
Why make a list of acceptable news sources? If you go with my idea of accepting any news source that has national reach in any country, you don’t have this problem of US bias.
That is what I would be inclined to do. However, just “national reach” is probably not enough. The Benin National Journal of Cross-Stitch might not pass the test.
Maybe “national reach and general interest”?
I like Freddy the Pig’s idea – just don’t pick people you had never heard of before you found out they were ill. It’s not enforceable, but I don’t think we have any real cheaters here.
I think it’s a poor definition, and what is the point anyway of adopting a rule that not only can’t be enforced, but isn’t even verifiable?
A case in point for me personally is Bettie Page. She came up in a Google search, and I had never heard of her. Then I did a little more looking and found they’d even made a movie about her a couple of years back. I put her on my list, but unfortunately she died back in December. The fact that you or I individually haven’t heard of someone is a very poor standard.
Back to an earlier question – does celebrity expire? In the RW, I’d say yes, but for purposes of this contest I’d say no. Perhaps we should have an understanding that the contest is for celebs and ex-celebs.
It’s not a definition; it’s a rule of thumb. And honor-system guidelines actually work quite well in online games where nothing material is really on the line. I am confident most players would abide by such a guideline if it were placed prominently in the rules.
I don’t see how your Bettie Page example argues against this guideline. The game should reward players who know more celebrities, shouldn’t it?
How do you decide “national reach” in the age of the internet? If Dumbshit, Delaware has a newspaper, it’s 99% certain it has a website reachable by any of us.
National reach means the publication is widely read across the whole nation. Ruling out the Dumbshit, DE Democrat would be an easy call.
Every rule is going to require judgment calls by the game moderator, but most such calls aren’t very hard–as long as the rules are kept simple.
That’s an interesting question in itself. Should it? Maybe it should reward players with better Google-fu – maybe it already does. Knowing more celebrities doesn’t make one any more or less able to predict their deaths, though if this proposed new rule is adopted it will expand their choices. I really don’t want to be snarky here, but I really think there is no point to a rule that can’t be enforced.
In fact, I can only think of one rule that CAN be enforced – a Google Search turns up hits about them prior to their death, and not about their grave illness.
I’m not married to this, though. I think amarone is the best judge of whether something is needed, and like others have said upthread, amarone should have the power to tweak the rules to make the contest fairer.
Sure, like the guy who can afford the automatic paint ball gun wins. 
I should think the fellas who do more research should be “rewarded” with winning.
As I recall, the person you picked as a substitute for Hunter Kelly was Layne Staley. And unlike Kelly, Staley did die in 2002 and you won that year’s deathpool. So everyone came out ahead. Except Layne Staley I suppose.
Ok I posted this before I saw RQ’s actual picks this year. I don’t know how you would word the rule but I have to call bullshit on that. A non-celebrity and all of his family. I may just have to bow out of this from now on if he comes in first with that crap.
To be fair, in 2008 there were forty people with more unique lists than RQ (measured by taking one point for every nomination of a person on your list). The second and fourth placed dopers had more unusual lists.
Now this year… Maybe he’s just giving us a chance.