Amy Winehouse Death: When Social Media PR Goes Off the Rails

The news of Amy Winehouse’s death on Saturday no doubt triggered a range of emotions: Misery and grief among her family and relatives and sorrow and shock (although many will have anticipated it) for her fans. But, sadly, for some organisations who thrive off the Winehouse brand, sentiment was quickly overridden by the potential for  big bucks.
Microsoft has come off the worst in trying to market the “Rehab” singer’s death. The computing company’s  UK-based Xbox PR branch tweeted, “Remember Amy Winehouse by downloading the ground-breaking ‘Back to Black’ over at Zune…”. After receiving enraged replies, @tweetbox360 was forced to backpedal, apologising for the “commercially motivated” tone of the tweet, presumably asserting that it was purely compassionate.