To be honest, would you expect anything less from Mr Jackson? I mean, he was the most successful pop icon of the 80s and 90s, owns the world record for best selling album and single ever, has been a famous singer since the age of nine, was such a powerful icon that he could sign to whatever record company he wanted to just by saying that he wanted to sign to them and actually managed to stop his father from beating him as a child by threatening that he wouldn't sing any more if his father carried on to beat him. Also, he hadn't been in the press for so long people kind of didn't realise that he was still around in the world until his proposed comebacks followed by his death so when it did happen, it was fairly random and shocking.
Then add in the fact that the first website to talk about this- TMZ- is famous for being an unreliable source people would've wanted to find out whether or not it was true before just believing it, going out and telling everyone and then finding out it wasn't true and look like a complete idiot. So, they turn straight to what most people would turn to for answers: Google. Google provided evidence, so they then talked about it on any social networks, such as Twitter, and with so many people doing this, the two sites crashing was inevitable.
The_root_of_all_evil said:
I've actually done that. That was the actual cause for Google crashing.