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The problem is that what Gawker did to Thiel, while not nice, was legal. If you do something perfectly legal that someone does not like, and that person has su
by banannaise 4y ago
The problem is that what Gawker did to Thiel, while not nice, was legal.
If you do something perfectly legal that someone does not like, and that person has sufficient money and/or power, they can simply go hunting for something illegal you've done (there's always something) and aggressively bankroll actions against you.
Thiel used Hogan and his case as a proxy to settle a personal beef.
This is not dissimilar from the cops tailing activists around in their daily lives, hoping they can find something, anything, to charge them with.
- kcatskcolbdi 4y ago>The problem is that what Gawker did to Thiel, while not nice, was legal. And then what Thiel did to Gawker, while not nice, was legal. If you're going to build a company on the idea of skirting legality in order to ruin people's lives, don't be upset when someone does the same thing to your company.
- KennyBlanken 4y ago> If you're going to build a company on the idea of skirting legality in order to ruin people's lives, don't be upset when someone does the same thing to your company. It took me a second to realize you were not talking about palantir. Or ebay. Thiel getting angry about a story around his sexuality (it wasn't "outing" him, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32265067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32265067) is pretty fucking hilarious coming from the guy who founded what amounts to a corporate-run NSA.
- filoleg 4y agoI think you are forgetting a significant part of that story, which is that Gawker published it around the time of Thiel's business trip to Saudi Arabia. Given the general attitude in that country towards homosexuality and that it is straight up a crime in SA, not only Gawker was essentially sabotaging his business deal, they were opening him up to physical danger and criminal prosecution.