When Selfies Kill

Looking for a new topic for your mystery novel? How about Death by Selfie. You may think this is funny, but given that there have been hundreds of documented deaths by selfie last year, I'm sure we'll see this method of death in a future crime novel. Of course the perpetrator needs to set it up with the victim, but that would be easy. "Why don't you take a selfie with the grand canyon in the background. Just step back a bit."  or "It would be fun to have a selfie with a shark"

From Silicon Beat:

Gruesome deaths are increasingly being attributed to society’s obsession with taking pictures of oneself having fun, going to envy-inducing places and posting it all on social media. Some governments and rule-makers are starting to think intervention, Reuters reports. 

“A cool selfie could cost you your life,” reads a poster from a campaign by Russia’s Interior Ministry, according to Reuters. The campaign uses videos and booklets, too, and is reportedly a response to “dozens of grisly selfie-related deaths and injuries in early 2015.” 

 It’s not hard to picture how some selfie-related deaths and injuries have involved grenades, bridges and wild animals. Also, guns: This week in Houston, Texas, a 19-year-old man reportedly died after posing with a gun while taking selfies. 

The sobering news comes after mostly lighthearted coverage of selfies. The word itself made its debut a couple of years ago in the Oxford dictionaries; selfie-takers have been chided for being rude; some museums have banned selfie sticks but are still encouraging selfies. Smile, there’s a selfie drone. 

But the urge to share photos on social networks has involved danger for a while: Last year, I wrote about “outlaw Instagrammers” who climb bridges and skyscrapers so they can post incredible images on the photo-sharing network. Speaking of incredible images: The Reuters article cited above says Europe is considering a law criminalizing social-media posts containing images of landmarks such as the Eiffel Tower in Paris or the Trevi Fountain in Rome.

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And here's a link to: 17 Deadly Selfies

What do you think? How would you use selfies in a crime novel?