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Gawker Pays $750,000 To That Guy Who Didn't Invent Email (gizmodo.com)
Shiva Ayyadurai still claims he invented email -- rather than the late ARPANET pioneer Ray Tomlinson. Now Gizmodo reports that Ayyadurai "will receive a $750,000 settlement from Gawker Media, the bankrupt publisher that he sued for defamation earlier this year."
As part of the settlement, Gawker Media has agreed to delete three stories from the archive of Gawker.com, including one about Ayyadurai. Univision, which purchased most of Gawker Media's assets [including Gizmodo] out of bankruptcy in September, deleted two Gizmodo posts concerning Ayyadurai -- over the objections of the editorial staff -- immediately after closing the transaction... The offending Gizmodo articles made the case that "a lot of people don't believe that Ayyadurai invented email," and that "networked communication actually predates [his] computer program by a few years." As Tomlinson told Gizmodo in one of the stories Ayyadurai succeeded in getting unpublished, the email formats that are so familiar today -- to:, from:, etc. -- were in use years before Ayyadurai "invented" them.
The third post was titled, "If Fran Drescher Read Gizmodo She Would Not Have Married This Fraud."
The third post was titled, "If Fran Drescher Read Gizmodo She Would Not Have Married This Fraud."
the site bullied people beyond what could be considered reasonable.
Because everyone knows we only want reasonable bullying.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
I didn't invent email either.
i supose he will have to sue wikipedia now or the writer. to be honest i do not know the evidence in this case except the wiki which states a constatment and makes a good argument for both but i would argue a evolution and his contestment a non contestment to ownership.
They posted sex tapes and called out people's sexuality just for clicks. Good riddance.
At least it paid of for him. Not saying it's right though.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I say it's a YUGELY sad story because freedom of speech is a good thing. Yes, Gawker pushed the line, but we if we are going to make errors about the lines around freedom of speech, we ABSOLUTELY should err on the side of MORE speech. We absolutely should NOT allow rich bastards to abuse the system because they can afford to hire lots of lawyers and support lots of lawsuits. Now to the predictions...
I predict you think the notion of blind justice has become a sick joke. Regardless of where you are on the ideological spectra, I predict we would agree the American judicial system is badly broken, though we would probably point at different examples of the brokenness. I would be hard pressed to decide between Citizens United or Bush v Gore as the worst Supreme Court decision of my lifetime, while you might point at Roe v Wade or various other candidates. Maybe the long-term perspective will put the "legal" crushing of Gawker above all of them.
I am not going to predict the outcome of the election, but if Trump wins, I predict that his promise to strength libel law and thereby attack free speech is a sincere one. Unlike most of his other promises, this is one he can really deliver on, and I predict the Senate Democrats lack the intestinal fortitude to stop him.
Still related to the First Amendment, but mostly in other parts of the Bill of Rights, I also predict that Trump should feel HIGHLY indebted to the FBI. In his gratitude, he may give them more access to YOUR email. Email privacy is like a contagious disease. If you and I are going to have email privacy, then we need to protect the privacy of Kevin Bacon, too, and all the people in between. At least in theory, right now the FBI has to go through all the bother and nuisance of showing probable cause and getting a warrant to look at any person's email. Now imagine the convenience of starting with any known criminal and thereby having permission to look at all of the email of his possible accomplices. Oh wait, now you have to get the email of the 2nd degree people, and in six degrees you have EVERYONE's email. So convenient.
Nobody expect the Email Inquisition.
(P.S. I'm paranoid. I think the NSA already has copies of all of my email, even including the spam in case it has secret messages to be discovered later. I still don't want the FBI to have parity.)
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
https://tools.ietf.org/html/rf...
https://tools.ietf.org/html/rf...
These pretty much cover this...
I will be presenting evidence.
You need a newsletter, or at least regular guesting on any show Glen Beck runs.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Read his claims carefully. If you consider use of a database critical to email then he did invent email.
Before anyone criticizes me, the above is humour. Yes, everyone outside of Microsoft realizes that use of a database is not necessary for email.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
They harassed him and tried to ruin his life. Hence why there is no more Gawker, the site bullied people beyond what could be considered reasonable.
Exactly. Obviously people dislike the guy for falsely claiming to have invented email, but that isn't what Univision is paying for. They're paying for having published weasel words that added up to secret evidence. They might have just been attempting to be snarky, but when you're publishing insults and shit designed to damage the reputation of somebody, you have to make sure you follow very narrow rules to protect yourself. It doesn't matter if the general thrust of what you're saying is true if you heap on so many untrue details that a reader ends up with a false understanding. If you read the articles in question, they packed so many insults in there, it is hard to tell what is actually claimed as a fact and what isn't; lots of untrue things that are probably sarcasm are phrased in the form of factual statements. And the weasel-worded stuff about "lots of people say" or whatever it was, combined with sarcasm-phrased-as-fact, well that quite easily will combine to be disparaging claims made based on secret evidence. And you're not supposed to do that.
Being right about one thing, and adding on fifty seven more insults that aren't actually true, and implying you have evidence of all of it? That's just moronic when done by a publisher.
Just give me a few minutes to redefine the meaning of the word "invent".
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Very progressive and modern name there.
I didn't invent a lot of things. Where's my $750,000?
Actually, as I noted in the "EMail Architecture" chapter of the "Handbook of Information Security", to To/From/Subject(Re) structured headers are far older than Internet email, or for that matter, computer-based electronic messaging. The structure of these headers can be found at least as far back as the inter-war period in military telegraphy and so-called tear-tape messaging. Those familiar with telegraphy-based messaging, civilian, military, or HAM-radio would recognize the elements of the messaging formats and protocol issues in the original RFCs.
I mean ManBearPig DID invent the internet, didn't he?
(Grow a brain, and don't bother quoting Snope's biased whitewash of Gore's claim - he was rather ineptly trying to claim credit for creating the internet, making "I'm Al Gore and I invented the internet!" a succinct parody)
Fuck Gawker
Why did they settle?
In 2012, an enterprising young Gizmodo blogger published the story of Shiva Ayyadurai, an MIT lecturer and renowned liar who pretends he invented email. Today, he adds another achievement to the resume, marrying Fran Drescher. Fran, you fucked up
What is falsifiable here exactly? Let's go through it :
The enterprising-ness is just a matter of opinion. It's true that they published something about Ayyadurai, perhaps not the whole of his story (I guess it didn't describe his birth for example, or how he sits on the shitter) but an interesting part of it; this is a reasonable use of the term "story".
True
True. He certainly is a liar to make that claim, and he is renowned in that many people have heard that claim and know it as a lie. I already had heard of him as a liar and I am no-where close to the story. Lets have a hand count on it.
Is Ayyadurai claiming it is not an achievement?
If untrue, this would be a defamation of Drescher, not Ayyadurai.
All sounds like normal stuff for a tabloid coverage of a celebrity. Ayyadurai wanted fame - this sort of stuff is what comes with it. Ayyadurai lied - this is the kind of flak to expect.
I read the article via the link posted on /. I had never heard of the guy, not giving a fuck as I don't about Fran D.R. Esher. But now I think the guy is a turd, a lying douchebag who only pretends he invented email, even though obviously it predates his "inventions" by several years.
Welcome to the wonderful world of the Streisand Effect, dumbass. Your attempts to suppress the truth have caused it to be spread even wider, moron.
Good job, you jackass.
https://web.archive.org/web/20160304000754/http://gizmodo.com/5888702/corruption-lies-and-death-threats-the-crazy-story-of-the-man-who-pretended-to-invent-email
i wonder if he will sue them too
Obviously people dislike the guy for falsely claiming to have invented email
I think you'll find the 99.9% of people have a complete indifference of vast proportions. It's not as if he's levying a fee on every email. No one cares. When the history books a written they'll say, like the do for so many other inventions, that there are competing claims to being the inventor and they all built upon existing inventions. Which claim you believe makes very little difference to anything.
Was it a case of Gawker believing their own premise (and that of many other people in the media) that revisionist history is always right and reparations must be made?
the site bullied people beyond what could be considered reasonable.
Because everyone knows we only want reasonable bullying.
Often, that is what 'news' businesses do.
Here's a business plan you could use to keep your bank account full: have it translated into Arabic, Farsi, Turkish and Urdu, and have it distributed all over the Middle East. There is no shortage of Jew-hating fanatics who'll gladly lap it all up, hook, line & sinker. In fact, you would do even better to make it a newsletter and add to the number of things they did in 9/11 w/ each succeeding edition
Why, is Beck one of those anti-Jewish nutjobs?
the site bullied people beyond what could be considered reasonable.
Because everyone knows we only want reasonable bullying.
Often, that is what 'news' businesses do.
Especially when they let out some truth. In this post-truth age, that is unforgiveable.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Why, is Beck one of those anti-Jewish nutjobs?
Oh, Mr Beck is shall we say, kind of entertaining. Crying, yelling, and willing to believe and promote some really strange stuff.
Used to have a show on Fox News. Eventually he got a little too crazy for them. Note - I don't think he is necessarily anti-jewish, but he is wayyyy out there.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
They harassed him and tried to ruin his life. Hence why there is no more Gawker, the site bullied people...
Oh so it's bullying when its the truth that he doesn't want anyone to hear... but when it's a falsehood that he wants to spread, it's 'news'. Is that how it works??? This is Donald Trump isn't it? Come on... admit it. ;)
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
In action. Iron, feels so satisfying.
I find no inconsistency between your claim that 99.9% of people are completely indifferent (which is to say, no more than 7.4 million people care to any extent) and GP's claim that some unspecified number of people "dislike the guy".
Shake hands, guys, you're having an agreement.
Married Fran Drescher.
When did Slashdot start using madlibs for headlines?
Actually the history books have already spoken... he's just fooled a couple people in show business is all. Creating email and creating an email client are NOT the same thing.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
Curso NR 10 online curso NR 10 curso NR 10 online
ZZ
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
To be expected
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^3
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
I guess this is what trolls do
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^4
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
I feel so helpless...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^5
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
People, take note of this...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^6
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Somebody take his gun away
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^7
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
He's an 'expat' for a reason. Who's he running from?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^8
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Good to see you finally hit the wall in the other thread...
I don't mind being your soft target. I want them to see the real you
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Z^9
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.