I did a little digging and I don’t think this is wholly accurate, the injunction was appealed successfully.
His initial effort in federal court to force Gawker to remove the posting failed. Mr. Bollea then turned to Florida state court, where Judge Pamela A. M. Campbell required Gawker to take down the video pending a trial.
A state appeals court overruled Judge Campbell, saying she had not established grounds for taking the rare and weighty step of blocking publication.
While the injunction was lifted, Gawker did not repost the video, but the text remains online.
One absurd thing to come out of this yesterday is Nick Denton is worth $150 million whereas AJ Daulerio, their (former) editor in chief, has $27k in student loan debt. Yet they publish article after article decrying CEO pay and income inequality.
That little nugget might cause a revolt with their writing staff.
Of course, except for the part where they edited the video, and posted a news story about it. The lawsuit isn’t even about the text of that post, just the 2 minute clip of the video that they edited and released. Which didn’t include the “n-word” rant that he had gone on, that was later leaked, and that may have not been by gawker, as it is clear they were not the only ones with a copy of the video. That was what cost him his job, not the sex tape, which was rumored about, and then released for years before he got fired by the WWE. It was because he is a racist asshole.
Given Gawker’s lengthy history over the years and attempts to “punish” people they didn’t like by sexually shaming them, calling women sluts and posting “stories” about their alleged one night stands, posting photoshopped bikini shots of them and calling them skanks, publishing hacked private emails and personally addresses, etc.,…I have little doubt that Gawker was responsible for releasing Hogan’s racist rant as punishment for him fighting back against their release of revenge porn against him – it’s the sort of thing they do, all the time.
And they generally seem proud of it. If not for the associated legal liability, they may well have happily claimed responsibility. But it was illegal. Hogan’s going to be judged on whatever foul-mouthed crap he spews, but what cost him his job was the illegal release of a taped private conversation - likely by Gawker - so it’s difficult to have sympathy if they’re turned to ash.
Even celebrities have a right to retain and bleat whatever imbecilic views they possess in private with the expectation any ravings, off color jokes, or vile beliefs will remain private and construed solely by the intended audience in a context that’s clear to the intended recipients.
Well, unfortunately that is how the jurors felt too. They overlooked the facts of the case, and the judge allowed it. Gawker’s past and motives don’t matter, what matters is what happened in this case. This is like any court case, sleazeballs or not, they deserve a right to a fair judgement about the particular matter at hand. When you are a juror, you are told to ignore media, forget the past (this means not condeming Hogan for his n-word rant) and only focus on the facts presented in the case. Their past/present/future is not on trial here, it is what happened in this particular instance.
The jury really hated former EIC A.J. Daulerio. He’s the genius that told the court that he probably wouldn’t publish a celebrity sex tape if a four-year-old was in it. Probably. Hogan’s lawyers were ecstatic when he said that. I don’t think there’s a word that adequately explains how stupid that was of him.
During the punitive damages phase, they asked the judge if they could further punish Daulerio with community service. The judge told them no, so they settled on an extra $100k just for him, even though he’s already in debt with student loans.
I was curious how this squared with the Donald Sterling case. He sued TMZ, but it was dismissed.
A California judge on Friday dismissed former Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling’s allegations that TMZ violated state privacy laws by publishing audio of him making racist comments secretly recorded by his ex-mistress, ruling the gossip rag is protected by free speech law.
At Friday’s hearing, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Frederick Shaller issued a thorough written tentative ruling indicating that he would grant TMZ Productions Inc.'s motion to dismiss the suit under California’s law barring suits that impinge free speech rights, known as the anti-SLAPP statute, just months after the billionaire filed suit against the publication and mistress V. Stiviano.
During the hearing, Judge Shaller told the parties that TMZ clearly appeared to be protected by the law in publishing the recording under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2001 ruling in Bartnicki v. Vopper, which held that the First Amendment protects media outlets that publish illegally recorded material as long as they didn’t make the recording themselves and the published statements are of public interest.
It seems California state law helps protect publishers of illegally recorded material, but the key determining factor is the judgment of public interest. Sterling’s racist comments as the owner of the Clippers and NAACP award-winner have more of a public interest than the sordid but private sex life of an entertainment personality.
I don’t have an opinion whether this is how society ought to be. There are compelling cases either way. It’s a fine line when hundreds of millions of dollars are at stake though.
Perhaps it’s worth considering that Hogan didn’t sue Gawker for releasing the racist quotes that cost him his job, at least to my limited understanding of this situation.
What evidence do you have of that? There may be glee from spectators who dislike Gawker for other reasons and so baggage gets conflated into posts about the result, but all the actual legal commentary on the case that I’ve heard has all concluded that Gawker was very clearly guilty based upon the facts of the case.
The quantity damages may not withstand judicial review, but Gawker is still likely going to be found guilty.
Celebrities, especially ones as public about their personal and sex life as Hulk Hogan, have a narrower zone of privacy than ordinary people. Regardless of questions about Gawker’s editorial standards and methods, self-promoters should not be allowed to seek attention around a specific topic and then claim privacy when the narrative takes an unwelcome turn. The benefits of publicity come at a price; and for someone like Hogan, whose whole life is a performance, it’s a full-time and long-term commitment.
Fine, that confusion may be a symptom of the modern era, in which everyday life itself becomes a performance on talk radio, reality television, or social media. Indeed, Hogan’s lead counsel spent some time explaining to the jury the concept of “scripted reality,” in which performance and real life are blurred. We heard an echo of the argument recently, when a spokesperson for Donald Trump dismissed his long history of misogynist remarks as the words of “a television character” rather than a presidential candidate.
But these always-on celebrities should not be surprised when their credibility is questioned, and journalists attempt to sort out what is real and what is fake. That’s our job, and we intend to pursue it both in the courts and on the page.
Such a dumb move. His lawyers must be freaking out at him raving about the substance of a lawsuit at the same time that they’re trying to appeal. He’s giving ammunition to the other side and further pissing off a court that already views Gawker’s conduct as way out of line.
Actually, having read the article, it sounds (as a layman) like he has a pretty good case for appeal based on the evidence they weren’t allowed to present, some of which he wasn’t even aware of. (This always bugs the hell out of me about our judicial system.) So he’s only hurting his case at this point.
I don’t feel like I know about the specifics to judge the case itself, but it is super weird to me that so many people are advocating a position that since Hogan talked about his actions that somehow makes all video public domain.
If a celebrity announces that they are expecting a child does that make their sex tapes public domain since “the public” is interested in how the child was conceived?
He seems awful, gawker’s core seems awful, so I have no particular side, I just find this line of argument so hard to follow.
I don’t feel like I know about the specifics to judge the case itself, but it is super weird to me that so many people are advocating a position that since Hogan talked about his actions that somehow makes all video public domain.
If a celebrity announces that they are expecting a child does that make their sex tapes public domain since “the public” is interested in how the child was conceived?
If a music artist announces that they have completed a new album does that make the album public domain?
He seems awful, gawker’s core seems awful, so I have no particular side, I just find this line of argument so hard to follow.
There is this old argument that justifies the existence of paparazzi and photojournalists in general. I believe that normally you have to sign a release or a waiver for someone to use a photo of you in a commercial work. But celebrities can be snapped without any such permission because they are celebrities. There’s some sense behind this – imagine a politician who refused to license their image to sources who are not friendly.
So I suppose this is an extension of that argument. IMO it’s entirely specious, but who knows what the precedent actually says or what the state law might be.
There’s some sense behind this – imagine a politician who refused to license their image to sources who are not friendly.
I’m being totally serious here:
What would be the downside in the case of the politician you just mentioned, if unfriendly sources couldn’t publish pictures of him?
