In light of the news that TMZ.com paid $62,500 for that police evidence photo of Rihanna, her fans have started a petition urging TMZ to apologize to the singer.
To TMZ.com Staff,
This petition is addressed to editors of TMZ.com who have posted a photo of injured Rihanna in the eve of her 21st birthday. We – the fans all around the world – feel that this action was very unethical and TMZ showed no respect to Rihanna’s privacy in these troubled times.
Media nowdays does everything to increse their popularity and often use actions against all moral and ethical principles. We want to prove that we do not support this.
Rihanna is a young and innocent woman and we do not understand why TMZ or anyone who has spread the pictures taken by LA police department, has decided to punish her by posting this violent material in order to gain publicity.
We demand from TMZ editors to post on their website an apologize to Rihanna and her fans for their disrespectful behaviour.
Sincerely,
I’m shocked that TMZ paid that much for the photo. I was just telling an industry friend yesterday that I thought the asking price was $25,000.
Supposedly, a snitch within TMZ leaked the price tag for the pic. But I think the purchase price was leaked deliberately (blogging is a competitive business and you do what you can to get traffic).
Was TMZ within their rights to pay for the photo? I think so. Everything has a price these days.
I fault the police employee who sold the photo — not TMZ. They say TMZ gave the cash to a relative of the employee so the money can’t be traced back to the employee. I hope that employee is caught and punished to the full extent of the law.
Thanks to Rihannadaily.com for the link!
