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Elon Musk Tries to Explain Twitter in ‘PEDO Guy’ Defamation Case

6 points by heshiebee 7y ago

cnst 7y ago
tl;dr? I'm in the middle of the article, and the best quote (from Musk) so far is: > There are a lot of things I say and not all of them have the same quality of thought
- keenmaster 7y ago
  The article is indeed lengthy. I'll try to distill and contextualize it: - Thai soccer team gets stranded in a cave - British expat and diving expert helps with the rescue effort - Musk also tries to help, dedicating a small team from SpaceX to design a submarine to rescue the kids, with preliminary approval of his efforts by the Thai government - The kids happen to be rescued before Musk's submarine could be put to use - The British expat got on CNN, implied that Musk was just in it for the publicity, and said that Musk can "stick his sub where it hurts" - Musk had a Google alert on his name and was quickly notified of this. He Googled the man's location and saw that he lived in an area of Thailand with a lot of trafficking victims, which gave him ammunition for a tweet. Allegedly, he didn't even know that it was the same person that helped with the rescue. - He got on Twitter shortly thereafter, defended his submarine, and called the British expat a "pedo guy" (Musk claimed that this was slang-like and he didn't actually mean that the expat was an actual pedo guy) - The expat sent Musk a letter asking him to retract his comments publicly. Musk saw it as a financial shakedown and refused. Later, in court, the expat was offended with Musk's reading of the letter as a shakedown. - Someone employed by Musk's family office hired an investigator who claimed that he can discover whether there is some truth to the "pedo guy" claim. He also said that he already had some intel. Any confirmatory evidence could be used as defense in a potential defamation suit, though it would be retroactive in this case. The investigator turned out to be a con man and turned up nothing of substance. - The expat filed a defamation suit which has gone to court. A judge and jury (of around 40 people, no less) are assessing the facts of the case, and Musk had to testify in court for several hours. I think the case would be more clear if the expat didn't attack Musk's reputation first.
pasttense01 7y ago
"“There are a lot of things I say and not all of them have the same quality of thought,” Musk said, in what was likely the understatement of the decade."
chmaynard 7y ago
The fact that this civil suit wasn't settled out of court before trial is absurd. The only reasonable explanation is that Musk views the trial as pure entertainment. He loves the attention he gets from the press and the opportunity it gives him to thumb his nose at the legal system.
- TillE 7y ago
  You're probably right, because why else would you go through all this when you could just quietly settle for a couple million or less. He's going to lose. His defense is an utter lie, there were multiple followup tweets making the intent of his accusation clear ("bet ya a signed dollar"). He's not going to save money or prove a principle, so he must be enjoying this.
  - cnst 7y ago
    You might as well try it out when the stakes are low, to prepare yourself for when the stakes might be higher. It's also not a certain probability that he's going to lose, either. Defamation is notoriously difficult to prove in the US.

6 points by heshiebee 7y ago

cnst 7y ago

tl;dr? I'm in the middle of the article, and the best quote (from Musk) so far is: > There are a lot of things I say and not all of them have the same quality of thought

keenmaster 7y ago
The article is indeed lengthy. I'll try to distill and contextualize it: - Thai soccer team gets stranded in a cave - British expat and diving expert helps with the rescue effort - Musk also tries to help, dedicating a small team from SpaceX to design a submarine to rescue the kids, with preliminary approval of his efforts by the Thai government - The kids happen to be rescued before Musk's submarine could be put to use - The British expat got on CNN, implied that Musk was just in it for the publicity, and said that Musk can "stick his sub where it hurts" - Musk had a Google alert on his name and was quickly notified of this. He Googled the man's location and saw that he lived in an area of Thailand with a lot of trafficking victims, which gave him ammunition for a tweet. Allegedly, he didn't even know that it was the same person that helped with the rescue. - He got on Twitter shortly thereafter, defended his submarine, and called the British expat a "pedo guy" (Musk claimed that this was slang-like and he didn't actually mean that the expat was an actual pedo guy) - The expat sent Musk a letter asking him to retract his comments publicly. Musk saw it as a financial shakedown and refused. Later, in court, the expat was offended with Musk's reading of the letter as a shakedown. - Someone employed by Musk's family office hired an investigator who claimed that he can discover whether there is some truth to the "pedo guy" claim. He also said that he already had some intel. Any confirmatory evidence could be used as defense in a potential defamation suit, though it would be retroactive in this case. The investigator turned out to be a con man and turned up nothing of substance. - The expat filed a defamation suit which has gone to court. A judge and jury (of around 40 people, no less) are assessing the facts of the case, and Musk had to testify in court for several hours. I think the case would be more clear if the expat didn't attack Musk's reputation first.

pasttense01 7y ago

"“There are a lot of things I say and not all of them have the same quality of thought,” Musk said, in what was likely the understatement of the decade."

chmaynard 7y ago

The fact that this civil suit wasn't settled out of court before trial is absurd. The only reasonable explanation is that Musk views the trial as pure entertainment. He loves the attention he gets from the press and the opportunity it gives him to thumb his nose at the legal system.

TillE 7y ago
You're probably right, because why else would you go through all this when you could just quietly settle for a couple million or less. He's going to lose. His defense is an utter lie, there were multiple followup tweets making the intent of his accusation clear ("bet ya a signed dollar"). He's not going to save money or prove a principle, so he must be enjoying this.
- cnst 7y ago
  You might as well try it out when the stakes are low, to prepare yourself for when the stakes might be higher. It's also not a certain probability that he's going to lose, either. Defamation is notoriously difficult to prove in the US.