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I think the complaint is worth reading, not because everything in it has already been proven true, but it's important to understand the claims being made: https

by racketcon2089 3y ago

I think the complaint is worth reading, not because everything in it has already been proven true, but it's important to understand the claims being made: https://static.texastribune.org/media/files/3428af84caea0c21b620498b06a7414e/X%20lawsuit%20media%20matters.pdf https://static.texastribune.org/media/files/3428af84caea0c21... It's also useful to understand the origin of Media Matters and know a little about its founder, David Brock. He's a lifetime "dirty tricks" political agent who by his own admission in his 2002 memoir has knowingly and repeatedly put not just misleading statements but outright lies in print before. Elon Musk also has a record making misleading statements and in some cases outright lies, but what's under discussion is the observable behavior of the platform which leaves behind a wealth of empirical evidence; logs, humans in the loop, third party caching and scraping, etc. If the outcome of this case becomes available to a prediction market, I would bet 10:1 against Media Matters prevailing absent a full retraction and apology which leads to the suit being dropped.

dragonwriter 3y ago
> I think the complaint is worth reading, not because everything in it has already been proven true, I think its worth reading, because it claims things are false and then describes how they are literally true, if perhaps incomplete. If you know even a little of the applicable law, its also worth reading for entertainment value because its shockingly bad even beyond directly undermining its own falsity claims. There's a lot to go into about how bad, but the crowning bit of absolute failure is that it names two defendants—Media Matters and Eric Hanonoki—but then fails to even mention any allegations against Hanonoki in any of its causes of action (he is mentioned only in footnotes past the “Jurisdiction and Venue” section.)
- racketcon2089 3y ago
  Is this your opinion as an attorney who is licensed to practice in Texas and has tried cases in this district before or are you speaking as a layperson? As a layperson I might agree with you, but in these sorts of cases the judges tend to play a pivotal role, as do both the economic power of the plaintiff and the existing reputation of the defendants. Many any engineer has been run aground by privileging the predictive power of their own literal interpretation over the case law and disposition of the actual judges.

dragonwriter 3y ago

> I think the complaint is worth reading, not because everything in it has already been proven true, I think its worth reading, because it claims things are false and then describes how they are literally true, if perhaps incomplete. If you know even a little of the applicable law, its also worth reading for entertainment value because its shockingly bad even beyond directly undermining its own falsity claims. There's a lot to go into about how bad, but the crowning bit of absolute failure is that it names two defendants—Media Matters and Eric Hanonoki—but then fails to even mention any allegations against Hanonoki in any of its causes of action (he is mentioned only in footnotes past the “Jurisdiction and Venue” section.)

racketcon2089 3y ago
Is this your opinion as an attorney who is licensed to practice in Texas and has tried cases in this district before or are you speaking as a layperson? As a layperson I might agree with you, but in these sorts of cases the judges tend to play a pivotal role, as do both the economic power of the plaintiff and the existing reputation of the defendants. Many any engineer has been run aground by privileging the predictive power of their own literal interpretation over the case law and disposition of the actual judges.