On 4/22/07, Angus McLellan angusmclellan@gmail.com wrote:
There's no deadline, so I heard. When we write about dead people, we nearly always plunder books, biographies, encyclopedias, and the like. We don't look up the 19 July 1851 New York Sun.
Because doing so is hard. It's quite likely that that edition is only on microfilm which means the odds of finding anything are minimal.
On the other hand Cyclopia quotes a primary source from 1665 so it does happen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclopia#_note-2
Andre Kasongo Ilunga is probably one of the most famous DRC cabinet members around but he is unlikely to ever get more than passing mentions in books.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_Kasongo_Ilunga