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Gawker files for bankruptcy. Today was a good day. (1 Viewer)

I'm pretty much a near maximum 1st Amendment fan and I can see some of Gawker's prior work as beneficial - including the Guccifer articles exposing Hillary's private email system and Jon Edwards - but publishing the private sex video of someone? Really there's no limit to that vileness, part of this is they were told to take it down by a judge and they publicly blew him off. It's really not 'ok'.

I think I recall the Fappening leading to takedown notices and expressions of disgust too. 

 
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SaintsInDome2006 said:
I'm pretty much a near maximum 1st Amendment fan and I can see some of Gawker's prior work as beneficial - including the Guccifer articles exposing Hillary's private email system and Jon Edwards - but publishing the private sex video of someone? Really there's no limit to that vileness. 
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The following First Amendment fan feels similarly....

Peter Thiel, Tech Billionaire, Reveals Secret War With Gawker

A billionaire Silicon Valley entrepreneur was outed as being gay by a media organization. His friends suffered at the hands of the same gossip site. Nearly a decade later, the entrepreneur secretly financed a lawsuit to try to put the media company out of business.

That is the back story to a legal case that had already grabbed headlines: The wrestler Hulk Hogan suedGawker Media for invasion of privacy after it published a sex tape, and a Florida jury recently awarded the wrestler, whose real name is Terry Gene Bollea, $140 million.

What the jury — and the public — did not know was that Mr. Bollea had a secret benefactor paying about $10 million for the lawsuit: Peter Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal and one of the earliest investors in Facebook.

A 2007 article published by Gawker’s Valleywag blog was headlined, “Peter Thiel is totally gay, people.” That and a series of articles about his friends and others that he said “ruined people’s lives for no reason” drove Mr. Thiel to mount a clandestine war against Gawker. He funded a team of lawyers to find and help “victims” of the company’s coverage mount cases against Gawker.

“It’s less about revenge and more about specific deterrence,” he said on Wednesday in his first interview since his identity was revealed. “I saw Gawker pioneer a unique and incredibly damaging way of getting attention by bullying people even when there was no connection with the public interest.”

Mr. Thiel said that Gawker published articles that were “very painful and paralyzing for people who were targeted.” He said, “I thought it was worth fighting back.”

Mr. Thiel added: “I can defend myself. Most of the people they attack are not people in my category. They usually attack less prominent, far less wealthy people that simply can’t defend themselves.” He said that “even someone like Terry Bollea who is a millionaire and famous and a successful person didn’t quite have the resources to do this alone.”

Mr. Thiel said that he had decided several years ago to set his plan in motion. “I didn’t really want to do anything,” he said. “I thought it would do more harm to me than good. One of my friends convinced me that if I didn’t do something, nobody would.”

Mr. Thiel has donated money to the Committee to Protect Journalists and has often talked about protecting freedom of speech. He said he did not believe his actions were contradictory. “I refuse to believe that journalism means massive privacy violations,” he said. “I think much more highly of journalists than that. It’s precisely because I respect journalists that I do not believe they are endangered by fighting back against Gawker.”

He continued, “It’s not like it is some sort of speaking truth to power or something going on here. The way I’ve thought about this is that Gawker has been a singularly terrible bully. In a way, if I didn’t think Gawker was unique, I wouldn’t have done any of this. If the entire media was more or less like this, this would be like trying to boil the ocean.” Mr. Thiel said he had not targeted any other media companies.

 
Interesting. #### with the bull, as it were and all of that...

That said, the clandestine nature of the angel investor for Hulk Hogan does worry me.  

 
I couldn't care less about Thiel's involvement. It's not like he bribed the judge/jury. He funded an expensive legal team. Kind of like what every huge corporation has on its side during lawsuits.

 
Peyton Marino said:
what do you mean?
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That he had funding for his own personal gain, which in my opinion leaves open the possibility that there will be subsequent suits brought at the expense of the First Amendment by powerful investors.

For example, can you imagine a blogger or someone similar fighting off a huge lawsuit like this one where the line isn't clearly drawn between privacy and the First Amendment? I can easily see that happening. Anything that stifles speech deserves, as the S. Ct. would say, strict scrutiny.  

 
I don't particularly care about Thiel.  And I think the Hogan story was in bad taste.  Still it was a story of public concern and generally short excerpts of video in news stories in those cases are protected speech.  The Fappening, where full videos were made available outside the context of stories about the data breach, isn't a very good analogue.  Those were copyright takedown notices where there was no fair use defense.

This is a IIED/publication of private facts tort case.  There is a lot of caselaw out there that this decision flies in the face of. 

 
Ramsay Hunt Experience said:
Kind of a bad day for the First Amendment.  I would expect Gawker to win an appeal, but the damage was done.
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not really.   they published private video for no apparent reason.   Pretty dumb actually.

ETA:   they have a lot more legal issues than Hogan/Thiel

Gawker is currently facing a wrath of litigation that's been connected to Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel. Besides the Hogan suit, there are claims from a journalist and the alleged inventor of e-mail who both say they were defamed. Gawker is also facing off against the parent company of Daily Mail in court and was hit with a copyright lawsuit this week over a photograph of an Uber car.
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The only thing I don't like is the shadiness of the funding of Hulk's lawsuit and a secret agenda.

 
The Hogan ruling was horrible for the First Amendment and will hopefully be reversed upon appeal.  I also love how all the Hogan backers just entirely ignore his racist ranting.

 
dparker713 said:
The Hogan ruling was horrible for the First Amendment and will hopefully be reversed upon appeal.  I also love how all the Hogan backers just entirely ignore his racist ranting.
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Why do people insist on misunderstanding the First amendment?

 
dparker713 said:
I also love how all the Hogan backers just entirely ignore his racist ranting.
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Great, and we love how the Gawker backers just entirely ignore Nick Denton and A.J. Daulerio being steaming piles of ####.

See how fun that game is to play?

A.J. Daulerio Doesn’t Regret Child Sex Quip at Hogan-Gawker Trial

Daulerio told Hogan’s lawyer that he “enjoyed watching the video... because I found it very amusing,” and was “proud” to have published it.
“Can you imagine a situation where a celebrity sex tape would not be newsworthy?” Mirell pressed.
“If they were a child,” Daulerio replied.
“Under what age?” Mirell asked.
“Four,” Daulerio answered.
 
Ramsay Hunt Experience said:
I don't particularly care about Thiel.  And I think the Hogan story was in bad taste.  Still it was a story of public concern and generally short excerpts of video in news stories in those cases are protected speech.  The Fappening, where full videos were made available outside the context of stories about the data breach, isn't a very good analogue.  Those were copyright takedown notices where there was no fair use defense.

This is a IIED/publication of private facts tort case.  There is a lot of caselaw out there that this decision flies in the face of. 
Click to expand...


Gawker had a taken down order from a judge, they insulted him instead of complying.

As long as the correct standard was used we have to concede there are moments where malicious intent is going to be present. Laws aren't designed so no one can win.

 
Abraham said:
Why do people insist on misunderstanding the First amendment?
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I'd love to hear this one.  How exactly am I misunderstanding the First Amendment?  Is Hogan not a public figure?  Is there nothing newsworthy about his personal life?  Please, enlighten me.

 
dparker713 said:
I'd love to hear this one.  How exactly am I misunderstanding the First Amendment?  Is Hogan not a public figure?  Is there nothing newsworthy about his personal life?  Please, enlighten me.
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Link to the law congress passed inhibiting Gawkers freedom of speech?  

 
Gary Coal Man said:
Great, and we love how the Gawker backers just entirely ignore Nick Denton and A.J. Daulerio being steaming piles of ####.

See how fun that game is to play?

A.J. Daulerio Doesn’t Regret Child Sex Quip at Hogan-Gawker Trial

Daulerio told Hogan’s lawyer that he “enjoyed watching the video... because I found it very amusing,” and was “proud” to have published it.
“Can you imagine a situation where a celebrity sex tape would not be newsworthy?” Mirell pressed.
“If they were a child,” Daulerio replied.
“Under what age?” Mirell asked.
“Four,” Daulerio answered.
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"America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free"."

 
dparker713 said:
The Hogan ruling was horrible for the First Amendment and will hopefully be reversed upon appeal.  I also love how all the Hogan backers just entirely ignore his racist ranting.
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one has nothing to do with the other, but i'm curious to hear you make the case

 
dparker713 said:
In case you hadn't noticed lately, public figures making openly racists remarks seems to be both newsworthy and quite well covered.
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and what does that have to do with Hogan winning an $140M  lawsuit against Gawker for publishing a private sex tape?

 
dparker713 said:
"America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free"."
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Nice attempt to move the goal posts.  I didn't address the legal aspect of your post.  I addressed the part where you questioned people having the gall to support Hogan because of personal statements he has made.  So I volleyed the ball back onto your side of the court with a Gawker rep's personal statements and positions.  Seems like you're supporting people who have made some unseemly comments too.  

Even if we presume that Gawker is legally right, what's legally right isn't necessarily what's morally right.  

 
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Gary Coal Man said:
Nice attempt to move the goal posts.  I didn't address the legal aspect of your post.  I addressed the part where you questioned people having the gall to support Hogan because of personal statements he has made.  So I volleyed the ball back onto your side of the court with a Gawker rep's personal statements and positions.  Seems like you're supporting people who have made some unseemly comments too.  

What's legally right isn't necessarily what's morally right.  
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I thought we were discussing a First Amendment case, someplace where what's legally right is tantamount.  

 
Gary Coal Man said:
We were until you brought a completely irrelevant aspect of Hogan's personal life into the equation.  Scroll up.
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Which part of his life is completely irrelevant?  Is this or is this not a man that has been the star of two separate reality shows? Has he not been a public figure for going on 40 years?

Answer me this, if they hadn't included a clip, would they have been justified in reporting on a celebrity sex tape?  Do you think Hogan's emotional distress is appropriately valued at $60M?  How about his actual loss of income at $55M?  

 
Sex tapes cannot be published without the consent of the people in them.  That is the law (and also why it's funny that people think Kim Kardashian and Paris Wilton werent complicit in the "leaking" of those tapes).  Gawker broke the law. 

 
dparker713 said:
Answer me this, if they hadn't included a clip, would they have been justified in reporting on a celebrity sex tape?  Do you think Hogan's emotional distress is appropriately valued at $60M?  How about his actual loss of income at $55M?  
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1. Yes they'd be justified in reporting on the existence of a tape IMO. 

2. I don't know.

3. I don't know what the question is...are you saying his actual loss of income has been valued at $55mm? If so, I don't know how I could answer that without the detail of what went into the valuation (but then, it wouldn't be "actual")

 
Abraham said:
Sex tapes cannot be published without the consent of the people in them.  That is the law (and also why it's funny that people think Kim Kardashian and Paris Wilton werent complicit in the "leaking" of those tapes).  Gawker broke the law. 
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That's copyright infringement.  There's fair use and 2 minutes of a 30 minute tape generally falls under fair use.

 
RUSF18 said:
1. Yes they'd be justified in reporting on the existence of a tape IMO. 

2. I don't know.

3. I don't know what the question is...are you saying his actual loss of income has been valued at $55mm? If so, I don't know how I could answer that without the detail of what went into the valuation (but then, it wouldn't be "actual")
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That's the breakdown of the verdict.  The jury claimed Hogan suffered $55M in economic harm.

ETA: If they're justified in reporting the tape, would they also be justified in writing a post detailing the contents of the tape?  If that's newsworthy, then how is the tape itself not newsworthy?

 
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Ramsay Hunt Experience said:
Kind of a bad day for the First Amendment.
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Unpack this for me.

1st Amendment does not guarantee that you can say anything to, or about, anyone with no civil repercussions.    I have not really followed the case, but isn't the gist that Hogan sued for defamation?  (Looking up a quick wiki - invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and infringement of personality rights.)  Not sure where the realistic grounds for appeal lie - those strike me a fairly straight forward jury questions.

 
dparker713 said:
ETA: If they're justified in reporting the tape, would they also be justified in writing a post detailing the contents of the tape?  If that's newsworthy, then how is the tape itself not newsworthy?
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Because one is a bunch of words and the other is A VIDEO OF TWO PEOPLE ####### WHERE AT LEAST ONE PERSON IS ALLEGED TO NOT HAVE KNOWN HE WAS BEING FILMED YOU MORON.

JFC. 

 
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