When will the media learn?

I live in the Omaha area currently, so when news broke of the shooting at Westroads Mall, it hit a little closer to home for me and those I know than to most in the country. But why the media obsesses over such stories when they do occur is beyond me.

The shooter (I won't give him the satisfaction of mentioning his name) at the mall wrote in a suicide note, "Now I'll be famous." Why did the kid do what he did as opposed to just killing himself? Due to the amount of press the Columbine shootings received, the Virginia Tech massacre received, etc., he knew darn well that if he went on a killing spree like the perpetrators in the other two horrendous massacres did, he'd get his face placed all over the news, the papers, and regardless of how he'd be remembered by most, he'd be remembered.

So, what ensued that day and in the days to come? Non-stop coverage. The kid got his wish. He became famous. Why do we continue to do this? There will continue to be copycats if the media obsesses over each and every such case. The 24-hour news cycle is one major problem. When stories like this arise, the news networks don't have much to worry about in terms of finding material to fill the 24-hours. With stories like these, they basically have an off day, because they need only to focus on that one story.

I just wish we'd learn from these previous mistakes and I'm not scapegoating the media for the kid being mentally disturbed. The media is irrelevant to his depression and other troubles, BUT, I highly doubt that without past media obsession over such slaughters, this guy would have thought he'd get "famous" by doing something like this. There's no way he'd become famous by committing suicide, unless he was a celebrity, which was not the case. So, through his words, "Now I'll be famous" in his suicide note, I have to believe the media is partly to blame for his shooting spree at the mall. Unfortunately, due to the obsession with this case, it'll probably happen again. From now on, I say just briefly mention the story on the news, the victims' faces/names, so that the friends and family know, and don't even mention the name/show the face of the perpetrator. He/she doesn't deserve any kind of face time. That's exactly what they wanted and I see no point in giving them that satisfaction.