Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 566 posts

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#291

Post by Lawtonfogle »

grellas wrote: post #278

A few thoughts: 1. The pressure point here was a court ruling declining to stay enforcement of the $140M judgment pending appeal. This left Gawker having to post a $50M bond in order to avoid enforcement proceedings by which its assets could have been seized and its business literally dismantled. Gawker may or may not ultimately prove to have a successful basis upon which to get this judgment reversed but, without a…

As to point 3, your question is still too narrow. We should ask if even self funding of legal matters should be allowed. Even if we say this case should have happened because of funding, we are left with two major issues.

First, we are left saying that this outcome would have been fine if Hulk had the money to do scorched earth. Second, we directly admit that the outcome of this case is the result of the money spent. Both of these, especially when taken together, are a death blow to any notion of justice in regards to law. And I don't even see this as a question, but a reality that we seem unable to admit to ourselves.

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#292

Post by quaunaut »

kebolio wrote: post #281
zecho wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

oh yeah for sure man

So giving a game a better review because you slept with the developer is perfectly ok?

You understand this has been disproved hundreds of times, not to mention, the "review" in question never existed?

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#293

Post by karmacondon »

grellas wrote: post #278

A few thoughts: 1. The pressure point here was a court ruling declining to stay enforcement of the $140M judgment pending appeal. This left Gawker having to post a $50M bond in order to avoid enforcement proceedings by which its assets could have been seized and its business literally dismantled. Gawker may or may not ultimately prove to have a successful basis upon which to get this judgment reversed but, without a…

You're the expert, but I don't see the harm of "maintenance". If Boella was wronged legally, he should be made whole. Whether he uses his own money to make his case doesn't change the correctness of the ruling.

People use the courts to get payback all the time, in a variety of ways. It's not about what's right, its about what's allowed. People with a lot of money have a big advantage in that regard. If we try to change that, we'll have to redo a lot of the legal system.

Thiel can do whatever he wants with his money, including using it on legal cases. The key rule that Gawker broke here was "Don't make powerful enemies"

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#295

Post by jdmichal »

grellas wrote: post #278

A few thoughts: 1. The pressure point here was a court ruling declining to stay enforcement of the $140M judgment pending appeal. This left Gawker having to post a $50M bond in order to avoid enforcement proceedings by which its assets could have been seized and its business literally dismantled. Gawker may or may not ultimately prove to have a successful basis upon which to get this judgment reversed but, without a…

My question with regards to (3), is that wouldn't re-enacting maintenance laws effectively destroy the operation of groups like the EFF and ACLU? Groups like these work though funding small cases, usually hoping to set precedent to make future cases much easier to bear. I think it's the kind of thing where there's definitely positive and negative uses of the same mechanism. As the saying goes: Guns don't shoot people, people shoot people with guns.

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#296

Post by Lawtonfogle »

nostromo wrote: post #18

Gawker may have been terrible, but we should all be a bit concerned at the precedent this sets. It's sort of like defending the free speech of terrible groups like the KKK. We do it because we treasure free speech, not because we support the KKK. I generally have positive feelings about Thiel, but his actions here make me very uneasy. I worry that the aristocracy will now use this method to try and close down unfavor…

If you care about free speech as it relates to porn, then this is nothing compared to some of the other limits put on free speech. Consider the Australian guy who was convicted for having sexualized drawings of the Simpsons.

Edit: grrrrr autocorrect

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#297

Post by jkern »

univalent wrote: post #165

The size of the award is insane. Wrongful death suits are awarded far lower amounts.

Honestly that's the part of this story that stands out to me. Clearly Gawker was in the wrong for posting the sex tape, but the size of the punishment seems massively disproportionate.

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#298

Post by lujim »

mevile wrote: post #280
lujim wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"when unethical, unnecessary, and/or pointless to do so, and may result in you taking a literal or figurative beating". ie "common sense" meets "pick your battles"

So you're totally OK with the chilling effect impact of wealth and political power on journalism. Got it.

While I do appreciate Gawker telling me about PT's sexual orientation and showing me the hulksters junk, I will reserve journalistic martyrdom status for Assange and Snowden. That's the ethical, necessary,pick your battles part of my previous post.

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#299

Post by smt88 »

danielweber wrote: post #287
smt88 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sex tapes don't become newsworthy just because the subject is a celebrity What if the sex might have been non-consensual (see: Dominique Strauss-Kahn)? What if the sex is between a public official and his employee (see: Bill Clinton)? What if the sex is illegal (see: Eliot Spitzer)? The fact is that sex can be of interest to the public, which means video of that sex can also be of interest to the public.

Do let us know when that situation happens.

http://gawker.com/5741535/police-find-photographs-of-berlusc...

(An irony that the first site that came up was Gawker)

Re: Gawker Files for Bankruptcy, Will Be Put Up for Auction

#300

Post by trsohmers »

notcotsotrot wrote: post #243
viggity wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they didn't say anything bad about Thiel, the reason he went after them is because they outted him as gay.

Incorrect, that's his sub-excuse. The actual reason is because of Valleywag reporting on e.g. his embarrassing failure of a hedge fund.

Failure of a hedge fund during the worldwide financial crash, out of which he started two new investment entities (Thiel Capital and Mithril) which are alive and well.

I can't understand why people are so upset about a third party paying legal expenses... what do you think the ACLU, EFF, and tons of other organizations and private citizens (either in individual or collective form) do? A jury (impartial to Thiel and unaware of his involvement) found Gawker and Nick Denton personally guilty. Denton himself is worth over $100 million (Gawker itself was valued according to reports to the court at $80 million, so he has plenty of assets outside Gawker), so this isn't a story of a big financier ganging up on a "little guy" that people are trying to make it out to be.

Post reply on HN