Even on mute, the tribute mattered: as the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales, showed in 1997, communal sorrow is moving, public frenzy is alarming, but the two together make for irresistible television. In a culture that considers Madonna’s divorce major news and breaks away from war and summitry to watch live police car chases, the arrival of the coffin on stage, covered in red blossoms, was the ultimate rubberneck moment.

Some network anchors seemed a bit mortified by their own unstinting and reverential coverage. Brian Williams of NBC, who sat on a special platform outside the Staples Center, told his colleague Lester Holt that the public had a way of deciding for itself what matters, “despite, at some times, the news media’s better wishes.” He added ruefully, “And this is an event because it is.”

But there was another, less obvious allure to the incessant, insatiable coverage. With so many hours to fill, television anchors and commentators give voice — literally and loudly — to the kinds of private, contradictory thoughts that so often dart through guests’ minds at a funeral. Flashes of sorrow and reminiscence collide with nosy curiosity about the will, the debts, custody battles, family entanglements and even the extravagant cost of the ceremony.

In the hours leading up to the funeral, the stars of Fox News debated whether deficit-ridden California should be burdened with the cost of security. They also worried about whether Mr. Jackson’s children should be raised by his mother, Katherine, since, as one Fox commentator put it, “Grandma Jackson watched her own children being abused at the hand of her husband.”