The Tweet Hereafter: Archiving the Final Tweets of Dead Celebrities

A Pittsburgh-based website is garnering worldwide attention for its somewhat morbid content: the last tweets by deceased celebrities.

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Whitney Houston at "The Love of R&B Grammy Party" in Hollywood, Calif., on Feb. 9, 2012, two days before her death. Her last tweet was a reply saying, "yes i am the really whitney."

Two Pittsburgh friends are getting international attention for their website “The Tweet Hereafter,” which aggregates the final tweets of celebrities before their deaths, according to CBS Pittsburgh.

The website’s creators, Jamie Forrest and Michael McWatters, came up with the idea when McWatters wondered about the last tweet sent by the conservative American author Andrew Breitbart before his death on March 1, 2012 (It was a retweet by Anonymous).  Forrest told McWatters that it would make for an interesting website, and The Tweet Hereafter was born.

Sure, it’s a bit morbid, but considering Twitter is epigrammatic by nature it’s a bit like recording the final words of famous people for posterity.

Right?

The creators told CBS Pittsburgh that they weren’t making any money off of the site, and thought it would be indecent to do so.  They also noted that if any families of the deceased were upset by the website, they would remove a specific tweet.

The two kept their project private until Olympic sprinter Oscar Pistorius allegedly murdered his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, CBS Pittsburgh reported.

(MORE: Oscar Pistorius’ Bail Hearing: On Third Day, Lead Detective Pulled Off the Case)

“Her final tweet was just so tragic,” Forrest told CBS Pittsburgh.

Steenkamp was killed on Valentine’s Day.

Not everyone’s last 140 characters are quite so apropos, Forrest notes. Many are fairly pedestrian, like “Oh, I had toast for breakfast this morning.”

(MORE: How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live)