©Republic

The death of Amy Winehouse over the weekend was, unfortunately, really no surprise. There’s an autopsy scheduled for today, and if the cause of death is not in some way drug-related, well, the Vegas oddsmakers just took a hit. (Update 8/23: Only alcohol in her system; that’s a surprise.)

This is not to make light of her life or death – rather, it’s just to set the stage for an odious article that ran in the Huffington Post about Winehouse. Posted Sunday, July 24, 2011, the article is titled “Amy Winehouse’s Untimely Death Is a Wake Up Call for Small Business Owners.”

WTF?

The author, one Tricia Fox, is touted as an Award Winning Entrepreneur & Marketer. OK…and what does Ms. Fox have to say about Amy Winehouse?

It would be terribly remiss of me not to blog about the untimely death of the 27 year-old British singer Amy Winehouse today.

Unlike others, I won’t be picking apart her chosen lifestyle, nor will I be judging her.

The article then goes into detail about how the choices Winehouse made hurt her “brand” – in other word, Fox is judging her. Not as a person, but as a brand.

Again, WTF?

And performance artists and their brand are tightly intertwined the way other artists are not. Faulkner and Hemingway were famous drunks, but that was between them and their typewriters. The books stand alone.

And why would Fox be remiss if she didn’t blog about Winehouse’s death? I’m at a loss.

The Huffington Post gets a lot of flack for not paying for all of its articles, but I can only hope this is one that came without compensation. Just sleazy and self-serving. I am breathlessly awaiting Fox’s next article explaining the lessons for entrepreneurs from the recent bombings/shootings in Oslo.

Postscript: Someone sent me a link to the Gawker article that shows even more contempt for Fox’s article than I do. When Gawker.com is making fun of you, you’ve gone round the bend…