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Gawker Files For Bankruptcy After Hulk Hogan Lawsuit (usatoday.com)
Gawker has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The move comes after the media house was ordered to pay up $140M to Hulk Hogan for publishing his sex tape. Gawker, which is known for its irreverent voice, is currently facing multiple lawsuits, backed by billionaire Peter Thiel, one of the people that Gawker has extensively reported on. USA Today reports: In its filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, Gawker is seeking to reorganize under the bankruptcy protection and there's no indication, as of yet, that it will cease publication. Gawker listed estimated assets of $50 million to $100 million and liabilities of $100 million to $500 million. [...] Thiel's funding triggered concerns about the possibility of First Amendment rights being quashed by wealthy individuals' funding of third-party legal claims against media organizations.According to a separate report, Ziff Davis is interested in purchasing Gawker and various properties that it owns. Gawker media also runs Gizmodo, LifeHacker, and Deadspin among other popular publications.
Justice may be blind, but she sure is greedy. Not that I'm a huge gawker fan, but clearly having a billion dollars lets you have your way in the courts. Had they posted a sex tape of some average Joe and/or not somehow pissed off Thiel, Mr. Average Joe would just have to live with it because he wouldn't have the money to fight it in court.
On the one hand I have no sympathy for Gawker and really don't mind seeing them go. On the other hand, it is deeply concerning that we may be in a situation where a billionaire can essentially destroy a company by funding lawsuits from other people. In the Hogan case it isn't clear to me if the jury knew that the lawsuit was being funded by Thiel at all, and this would be something that they should know. As a general rule, it seems like this sort of thing is a victory for the very powerful. After this, all media are going to think very carefully before doing any reporting on the very wealthy and be especially wary of reporting on anything Peter Thiel is doing. There's a clear chilling effect here.
WTF has the First Amendment got to do with this? The First only stops the government from censoring you. I, or any other private individual or company, can still tell you to shut up.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
... and nothing of value was lost.
Yes, it is troublesome that this may have revenge for some semi valid journalism
This all started when Gawker outed Peter Thiel for being gay. I don't see how that is "valid journalism". They have a 1st Amendment right to do what they did, but they are still scum for preying on someone's private life. What happened with HH went way over the line. They got what they deserved.
But you might care about the excellent sub-sires operated by Gawker, including Kotaku.com, io9.com, gizmodo.com, and others. These sites are actually high quality, but their existence is predicated on the fact that Gawker.com itself gets many more views. So it would truly be a shame if these other sites disappeared. Although I suspect many of the commentariat here would shed no tears if Jezebel.com went out of business.
Thanks to Hulk/Thiel's victory, however, all of us average Joes are a little safer from media's prying eyes. And, given the government's history of buying from commercial suppliers the data, which it is not allowed to collect itself, from the government too.
And, should some other gav-gavker find our sex-life worthy of publication, it would be easier for us to find a lawyer willing to work on contingency. The world really did become a (slightly) better place thanks to this case.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
You can't, though. If the case had not been valid, it would not have bankrupted them.
They also had the option to obey the court's orders, which they elected not to do.
They have only themselves to blame here. Inasmuch as this is chilling to those who would steal sex tapes and set up a revenge porn site... good riddance. I could justify considering revenge porn obscene, which would strip all first amendment and copyright protections from that specific speech.
Nick Denton and Gawker Media were found guilty in a Court of Law of invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Things they appear to have done many times before to many people. Most of the times they did these things, they got away with their terrible actions for various reasons. Mostly, they picked on people who could not afford to fight them. In these cases, it was Gawker who was harnessing the power of the wallet in, or out of the Courtroom.
Please don't cry about how unfair it was that Theil could bring down Gawker with his money. It was Gawker that has been playing that game all along.
"The ferrets, they're every where I tell you!"
I don't see any problem in Thiel using his money to take out pieces of shit like Gawker. They posted illegal revenge porn and then refused to take it down when a judge ordered them to. It doesn't matter that Thiel had a personal interest in the case and none of that makes him a terrible person that deserves to be "launched in to the sun."
Gawker has made a long business of vile personal attacks. You seem to think that's OK as long as they attack someone you don't like. That's what's destroying America: anything's OK if it hurts the "other side". That sort of thinking leaves only rubble at the end.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Justice being done is not "using the legal system as a proxy." If he was using his wealth to keep Gawker tied up in court until they were bankrupt, that would be wrong, but that's not what he was doing. He was funding a very valid lawsuit, which the court agreed was valid.
Gawker's bankruptcy is not the result of a billionaire abusing his position; its a result of their own behaviour. I for one would quite like to see more billionaires funding lawsuits against the scumbag elements of the media.
Gawker is a terrible bottom feeder. But when the next billionaire gets pissed at Slashdot for reporting on how his newfangled techo-marvel is a POS, and forces it into bankruptcy and closure, you might care more.
Gawker got curb-checked for invasion of privacy by posting what is basically revenge porn. In order for your warning to come true, Slashdot would have to do something similar, and I for one do *not* want to see a Steve Ballmer Sex Tape, y'dig?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
their SJW feminazi propaganda about games. same thing for gizmodo and io9. fuck those guys for trying to inject their sexual politics in every goddamn thing AND moderating out dissenting opinions. may they rot in a shallow grave.
Gawker is a terrible bottom feeder. But when the next billionaire gets pissed at Slashdot for reporting on how his newfangled techo-marvel is a POS, and forces it into bankruptcy and closure, you might care more.
This is not about Gawker anymore, this is about a billionaire using his money and influence to destroy someone using the legal system as a proxy.
Not when Gawker releases private data, videos, etc without the permission of the person being filmed. We're all UP IN ARMS about the FBI, NSA, CIA doing illegal wiretapping, recording, videotaping when they don't even view the damn data but suddenly we're okay with Gawker buying illegally recorded footage and releasing it for ad revenue. There's something really wrong with America.
This couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch of worthless parasites!
Have you already forgotten about gamer gate?
We're trying, but you idiots keep bringing it up like it's the fucking Pentagon Papers or some such shit.
I'm telling you right now: Gamergate is going to slot right next to 'safe spaces' when future generations make fun of you.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
How dare a gay person not support the 'gay agenda' set out for him. Feminists do this too. They call women who want the traditional housewife role 'gender traitors.'
The best part is that a few decades from now, the blatant self interest, hypocrisy, entitlement, and ignorance of people like you will be looked at in the same light as your fellow bigots in the kkk.
This is not about Gawker anymore, this is about a billionaire using his money and influence to destroy someone using the legal system as a proxy.
Your actual complaint there is that the legal system is too expensive for even Hulk Hogan to afford, much less Gawker's other victims. If there were true justice, Hogan never would have needed Thiel's help. Thiel would have had no power in the situation.
But make no mistake - Gawker is the entity that fucked itself royally; Thiel just provided the lube.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
No you don't. You just want to scream at your monitor about SSJJJJJWWWWWSSSSS RUINING EVERYTHING GODDAMMIT. Every "controversy" you guys levy at Kotaku proves to be absurdly weak. Your current tactic is calling every article you don't like "clickbait," thereby ruining yet another legitimate term with your lame windmill tilting.
Peter didn't do anything wrong by helping him. He was, after all, highly motivated. After all free speech protects you from being silenced by the government. Not someone with lots of money and thus power.
It set a pretty dangerous precedent, though. Mess with the rich and get crushed by the weight of their resources.
Any intelligent billionaire should now realize that all it takes to secure yourself against bad press is to make it known that you'll go scorched earth on anyone who releases a story you don't like, bankrolling anyone willing to start a lawsuit against that organization.
It is completely within the law, just like the press is within their 1st Amendment rights to publish negative stories (within reason - i.e. libel and slander laws still apply), but it brings with it the death of free press, just as much as if the 1st was repealed.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."