Greg's Corner

Tagged: free press Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

• 

  Geebo 11:14 am on January 12, 2017 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: free press, lawsuit ( 47 ), Shiva Ayyadurai, Techdirt   

  Is Techdirt about to meet the same fate as Gawker? 

  

  As followers of industry news may remember news blog Gawker and its parent company Gawker Media were sued into bankruptcy. Pro wrestler Hulk Hogan sued them for posting his now infamous tape of his indiscretions with his best friend’s wife. Then it turned out that the lawsuit was bankrolled by venture capitalist Peter Thiel who had a personal grudge against Gawker. Now tech news blog Techdirt may be meeting a similar fate.

  Techdirt is currently being sued by Shiva Ayyadurai. Mr. Ayyadurai claims to be the inventor of email stating that he invented it while working at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey at the age of 14. He has even trademarked the phrase ‘The Inventor of Email’ and his website is inventorofemail.com. Techdirt has maintained that Mr. Ayyadurai is hardly the inventor of email and has posted stories to that effect.

  The reason that this lawsuit smacks of the Gawker suit is because Mr. Ayyadurai has employed the same law firm used by Peter Thiel and Hulk Hogan against Gawker. Unlike Gawker, Techdirt does not have the financial backing that Gawker did and even if Techdirt is found to be not guilty of libel, the financial aspect of the lawsuit could potentially bankrupt the news site.

  This is just another chapter in the recent history of those with deep pockets trying to silent the media who have opposing viewpoints against them. While Peter Thiel was not the first he sure seemed to make it more acceptable to do so.

   

  Leave a ReplyCancel reply
• 

  Geebo 9:57 am on October 17, 2016 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Donald Trump ( 11 ), First Amendment ( 4 ), free press, Peter Thiel ( 13 ), Sheldon Adelson   

  Why is Peter Thiel doubling down on Donald Trump? 

  

  Donald Trump’s campaign for President took a massive publicity hit recently after recordings of misogynistic comments he made in private were made public. This doesn’t help with Trump’s image since many already view him as being xenophobic and racist. So one would have to wonder that after all this controversy, why would venture capitalist Peter Thiel double down on Trump by donating an additional $1.25 million to the Trump campaign?

  As TechCrunch points out, Thiel is not only an immigrant to this country, having been born in Germany, bur he is also openly gay. These are two camps of voters that have not exactly been supportive of Trump. A Thiel representative told TechCrunch that the reason Thiel supports Trump is…

  Thiel is motivated by his view that feels the country ‘needs fixing’, and thinks Mr. Trump pull it off.

  So the question remains, what does Peter Thiel think needs fixing in our country?

  If you go by history, what may need fixing in Peter Thiel’s mind is a free press that he may view as being a little too free. BY now we all should know about Thiel’s backing of Hulk Hogan’s lawsuit that bankrupted Gawker in revenge for Gawker outing Thiel as gay. This is not to mention that there was an alleged Thiel backed motion to threaten Gawker further over a piece they wrote about Donald Trump’s hair.

  You could also surmise that the Trump campaign is friendly to a less free press due to another one of its financial backers, and that’s casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. Adelson also bought the Las Vegas Review Journal newspaper that was previously critical of him. Since the purchase of the Review-Journal it’s long been rumored there that stories about Adelson are not viewed as newsworthy as they used to be.

  Trump is no fan of the media himself so it’s not out of the realm of possibilities for Trump and his uber-rich supporters to form a cabal of billionaires that are willing to buy their way around the First Amendment.