"Showbiz" journalism: Just as long as it takes some space up

Exhibit A

22 October 2008: lovely, tragic, Kerry Katona appears on popular TV programme This Morning. In an incoherent interview, she touches on several topics, including medical warnings that, following cosmetic surgery, if she continues to smoke her nipples will fall off, a bombshell reported in this blog the following day (via a story on the Mail website; sadly, the army of researchers at JMP Towers didn't catch that edition of This Morning).

11 November 2008: the story appears for the first time in The Sun's Bizarre showbusiness column, simply repeating what Katona said in that interview.

Exhibit B

Viz's Matthew Shight column from about 2001, a one-off satire of piss-poor tabloid show-biz columns ("I went to see my superstar pal, Madonna, at the Hammersmith Odeon last week. After a wonderful gig, I went backstage where she opened her heart exclusively to yours truly. "Who's this asshole? How did he get past security?" she gushed."). At the bottom of the page: "KNOW ANYTHING THAT MIGHT FILL THIS COLUMN? ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING. JUST AS LONG AS IT TAKES SOME SPACE UP. CALL ME ON 09090 400 919"