Hulk Hogan awarded payout over Gawker sex tapes

So I see a lot of journalists on twitter defending Gawker. In my opinion Gawker is making journalists look bad at first place. I believe in press freedom but is "revenge porn" freedom of press ? If an unknown party leaked that sex tape, most journalists would condemn that and not label it "freedom of speech" so why the double standard ?

Good for him.<p>I think Jerry &quot;Tycho&quot; Holkins expresses best how I feel about Gawker in this whole affair.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.penny-arcade.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;post&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;14&#x2F;the-didactic-order" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.penny-arcade.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;post&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;14&#x2F;the-didact...</a>

I am sure Gawker didn&#x27;t help their case with jurors when they said they would only draw a line at posting a sex tape of a four year old [1]. If they did have a chance of winning this case, they totally shot themselves in the foot with their testimony.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;nypost.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;09&#x2F;gawker-editors-line-a-sex-tape-of-a-4-year-old&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;nypost.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;09&#x2F;gawker-editors-line-a-sex-tape-...</a>

I&#x27;m not sure how I feel about the verdict (freedom of speech vs privacy), but I&#x27;m really happy that the media sexist bias was exposed. It was really distasteful how they were criticising and condemning &quot;The Fappening&quot; (i.e. female stolen porn) while happily participating in the reverse (Hulk Hogan&#x27;s male stolen porn).

I&#x27;ve long stopped reading Gawker for serious news or even entertainment...but I&#x27;m going to miss it as it is possibly the only independent online media outlet that actually made a profit. BuzzFeed might make a profit but NBC(Comcast) owns $200M of it [1]. Vox, too, got $200M from NBC [2]. Vice, as far as anyone can tell, is not near profitability (it just started its own TV channel), and has $400M from Disney [3]...and everyone else that is not a traditional news organization is not really on the radar for long-term viability.<p>What&#x27;s sad is that this was pretty much an unforced error. They already got plenty of page views from the post that described seeing the tape. The editor who made the decision is no longer even there and failed at his own online media startup. What shouldn&#x27;t be overlooked is how much Gawker invested in its own content-management system, Kinja...the estimates are as high as $20 million for what is literally a glorified, multi-site commenting system [4].<p>Very few online organizations could survive that kind of sunk investment...Gawker&#x27;s editorial bent was such that it would post the Hogan tape just for the hell of it rather than to make pageview profit...but Gawker pretty much lost all of its great writers and reporters over the past two years, including Adrian Chen (who now seems to regularly turn huge features at the NYT and the New Yorker) and Nitasha Tiku.<p>I&#x27;m going to miss Deadspin especially. Sports news and entertainment was already monopolized by ESPN&#x2F;Disney...we don&#x27;t even have Grantland anymore.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;08&#x2F;18&#x2F;buzzfeed-nbcuniversal&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;08&#x2F;18&#x2F;buzzfeed-nbcuniversal&#x2F;</a><p>[2] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;08&#x2F;13&#x2F;business&#x2F;media&#x2F;nbcuniversal-invests-200-million-in-vox-media.html?_r=0" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;08&#x2F;13&#x2F;business&#x2F;media&#x2F;nbcuniversa...</a><p>[3] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;articles&#x2F;2015-12-08&#x2F;disney-said-to-double-investment-in-vice-media-to-400-million" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;articles&#x2F;2015-12-08&#x2F;disney-sai...</a><p>[4] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;digiday.com&#x2F;publishers&#x2F;gawkers-kinja-retreat-shows-false-hope-in-publishers-licensing-tech&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;digiday.com&#x2F;publishers&#x2F;gawkers-kinja-retreat-shows-fa...</a>

Nick Denton statement on the jury verdict:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;nicknotned&#x2F;status&#x2F;710973280308559873" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;nicknotned&#x2F;status&#x2F;710973280308559873</a><p>Hulk Hogan statement on the jury verdict:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;HulkHogan&#x2F;status&#x2F;710988297284292608" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;HulkHogan&#x2F;status&#x2F;710988297284292608</a>

So let&#x27;s see. Hulk Hogan is worth $25M according to the interwebs. His reputation is in tatters for the video of him doing something he did. So he gets awarded almost 5 times as much for lost earnings, as he is worth total?<p>Of course we all know this will go to appeal, where the real fate will be decided. Gawker does not have 115M to pay, and Hulk is not likely to find himself 5x richer.<p>The real question is where does the First Amendment end up with this ruling? That is the change (or not) that would matter most to the average citizen.

I think @Popehat summed this up nicely:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;Popehat&#x2F;status&#x2F;710972390566563845" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;Popehat&#x2F;status&#x2F;710972390566563845</a><p><pre><code> First they came for Gawker, and I did not speak out. Because fuck Gawker.</code></pre>

What&#x27;s the time table for Gawker&#x27;s payment? Can they appeal without paying?

Putting aside the matter of case itself, I&#x27;m getting a lot of schadenfreude out of watching Gawker fail to hold itself to the same standards it keeps for everyone else.<p>As of now, two plus hours after TechCrunch [1], BBC [2], Recode [3], CNN [4], Buzzfeed [5], HN [6], Ars Technica [7], Wired [8], Slate [9] and countless other sites have all published articles about the verdict, Gawker&#x27;s site is silent on the topic. And this comes after they&#x27;ve done daily articles throughout the trial, but now the pill is apparently too bitter to swallow.<p>I don&#x27;t think that being first is always best, but Gawker sure seemed to think so up until now. Apparently reveling in public about their own misfortune is finally the bridge too far.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;jury-awards-hulk-hogan-115m-in-sex-tape-lawsuit-against-gawker&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;jury-awards-hulk-hogan-115m...</a><p>[2] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;world-us-canada-35849140" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;world-us-canada-35849140</a><p>[3] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;recode.net&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;florida-jury-hands-hulk-hogan-a-115-million-victory-in-the-gawker-sex-tape-trial&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;recode.net&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;florida-jury-hands-hulk-hogan-a...</a><p>[4] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;money.cnn.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;media&#x2F;hulk-hogan-gawker-jury-deliberations&#x2F;index.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;money.cnn.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;media&#x2F;hulk-hogan-gawker-jury...</a><p>[5] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.buzzfeed.com&#x2F;maryanngeorgantopoulos&#x2F;hulk-hogan-gawker-sex-tape-lawsuit-verdict#.qlXQeygRm" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.buzzfeed.com&#x2F;maryanngeorgantopoulos&#x2F;hulk-hogan-ga...</a><p>[6] right here!<p>[7] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;arstechnica.com&#x2F;tech-policy&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;115-million-verdict-in-hulk-hogan-sex-tape-lawsuit-could-wipe-out-gawker&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;arstechnica.com&#x2F;tech-policy&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;115-million-verdi...</a><p>[8] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wired.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;jury-awards-hulk-hogan-115-million-gawker-sex-tape-post&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wired.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;jury-awards-hulk-hogan-115-mill...</a><p>[9] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.slate.com&#x2F;blogs&#x2F;the_slatest&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;jury_awards_hulk_hogan_115_million_in_gawker_suit_punitive_damages_still.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.slate.com&#x2F;blogs&#x2F;the_slatest&#x2F;2016&#x2F;03&#x2F;18&#x2F;jury_award...</a>

I agree that we live in a country With a constitution that gives us free speech, but while we have the right to say something, that doesn&#x27;t relieve us of the responsibility of what we say.<p>Gawker had every right to post this video, they also now have the full responsibility for the consequences. This case has established that you can still post sex tapes, but you now run the very real risk of loosing a lot in doing that.<p>This court case doesn&#x27;t say you can&#x27;t, it just says that doing it could be prohibitively expensive to do it.

Gawker said it best,<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;jezebel.com&#x2F;5985635&#x2F;an-idiots-guide-to-free-speech" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;jezebel.com&#x2F;5985635&#x2F;an-idiots-guide-to-free-speech</a>

Good. Gawker, frankly, needs to be destroyed at this point.<p>I&#x27;m all for free speech but you don&#x27;t need to post non-consensual porn to the internet to accomplish that.

Before anyone goes on a &quot;Gawker is a terrible site, they deserve it&quot; tangent, keep in mind that this does set precedent for other individuals to sue other media companies for massive amounts of money, which could be another problem for an already-struggling ecosystem. (Although in fairness, this incident is particularly egregious, especially as they disobeyed a judge&#x27;s order to take down the video)

Most of Gawker is terrible, but if the company goes down I hope Jalopnik survives in some form. They write good articles about cars and racing, and appear to maintain high ethical standards. <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;jalopnik.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;jalopnik.com</a>

Yeah, fuck Gawker (and Deadspin too, for that matter) but if this means the death of Jalopnik that&#x27;s going to free up at least an hour of my day. :(

On a side note: I can&#x27;t find this tape anywhere inline. Quite the cleansing however they pulled that off.

I still don&#x27;t understand the fascination with celebrities, esp. in the anglo world.

Both sides in this case were utterly contemptible. I would have found that Gawker invaded Hogan&#x27;s privacy and awarded Hogan one dollar in damages, leaving everyone unhappy but the lawyers.<p>Invasion of privacy, despite its questionable origins, is now generally recognized as a valid tort and outside of the protections of the First Amendment. No new precedent is being set here.