Yeah, I’m hugely late to the party on this one, but since I’m still seeing this discussed and argued on my Twitter feed I’m going to chime in. On the one hand you’ve got a load of gamers feeling like they were attacked and, on the other hand, a load of writers claiming bewilderment and saying, “geez, [x] is dead is, like, a super common expression. What’s your problem?”
Well…
1) There is an ENORMOUS difference between saying, “[inanimate objects] are dead” and saying, “[group of people] are dead”. For example, “movies are dead” is less contentious than, “moviegoers are dead”.
2) There is an ENORMOUS difference between saying, “[those people] are dead” and saying, “[you] are dead”. For example, “authors are dead” is less contentious than, “readers are dead” since the people reading the article are, by definition, readers.
3) There is an ENORMOUS difference between saying, “the term ‘[group]’ is dead” and saying, “‘[group]’ are dead”.
In other words, show me a bunch of examples when this format of statement has been applied when the thing being called “dead” represents 100% of your readership and you might have a point in saying that this is a really common thing to do. If you can’t then just admit that you were either being deliberately provocative and reactionary, or you really didn’t think through the headline.
Edit: …and the point still stands if you swap “dead” for “over” or any other similar word.