hey gawker dudes. what the fuck is wrong with you?

Unironic use of the word 'sheeple' should earn you a lifetime ban from writing in exchange for money imo.

http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20060906013253/muppet/images/4/4e/Ernie.nose.jpg

Oh wait I thought that was the famous writer erndb, my bad.

Something Called Fudge (Old Lunch)
Posted: July 17, 2015 at 1:51:06 PM
Unironic use of the word 'sheeple' should earn you a lifetime ban from writing in exchange for money imo.

uh it was actually double ironic, know the levels

ehhhhh i dont really think it was

Evidently that's just some manager-level guy who works for gawker; I erroneously thought it was a gawker writer or editor. I regret mocking it.

extremely embarrassed for ppl itt who cant even identify two levels of irony

lol aight

We're constantly operating on at least two levels of irony afaict.

I personally acknowledge minimum four irony levels in all published writing

some self-aggrandizing puffery about their supposedly fearless journalists who publish hard truths that others are afraid to touch

Judging by some of the responses from gawker writers/editors, it's hard not to admire Denton's ability to get his people to truly believe this line of bullshit

i feel like a couple of the people expressing shock that a human being could post something cruel, stupid, or ill-advised on the internet could use a gigantic dose of self-awareness

just saying

it's hard not to admire Denton's ability to get his people to truly believe this line of bullshit

Cult leaders are frequently quite charismatic.

I'm confused about Denton going on about "truths" when this story doesn't have any credible source or evidence. Looks like they got clowned by a crazy person who fabricated the whole thing. Hilarious.

xxp

the difference is people here cant ruin other peoples lives

oh can't they

i don't think it's all that likely that the whole thing was completely fabricated, i don't think that's the general public feeling, although certain aspects of it are a little fishy and it doesn't seem like everything was thoroughly vetted to remove doubt.

here we go guys

https://twitter.com/Nero/status/622058014930038784

Milo Yiannopoulos Verified account
‏@Nero

My thoughts on Gawker will be up in a little while

xpost The whole thing is fishy as hell! But if it's actually true then Gawker is a participant in a blackmail scheme.

For a small gratuity I am willing to reveal Milo's thoughts ahead of time.

genuinely surprised it was taken down tbh

yea treating this like a source reliability problem and not a gross ethical breach is shooting wide of the mark imho

i know this is incredibly presumptuous but cld some summarize for me im actually not clear on what happened

the opening paragraphs of greenwald's piece are a fair summary if you don't want to go the article itself

he's not saying they crossed a line, he saying the line moved on them

― gwyneth anger (patron sailor), Friday, July 17, 2015 12:26 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think this is basically true. there was a period where nobody took gawker seriously and they sort of celebrated that. not saying it was good or bad, just... they're trying to play a different role in the pecking order of publications (in large part i think because of the continuing death of print, etc)

like there was a time when pitchfork was this weird thing on the internet full of quirky stunt reviews and then the print kingmakers faded and pfork said "hey, wait, i guess we are in a different position now and should produce content accordingly."

this is going to be a... not painless process.

tbh i don't see a damn thing remotely homophobic about the piece and i don't see how the dude is not a public figure, but i also don't see why as a story it is anything but tabloid sleaze.

he's not a public figure

being in management in non-editorial side of nyc media and having a brother who served in the cabinet just doesn't add up to 'public figure'

Gawker participated in the blackmailers scheme and protected the blackmailer's identity.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/122325/has-gawker-decided-stop-being-gawker

Since other people’s sex lives are always interesting and Gawker’s journalistic purview includes media culture, under Denton’s rule it is justified in reporting on the sex life of anyone who works in publishing in any capacity. And it's worth noting that these have not just been Gawker's rules of journalistic engagement, but that have much of the media. The New York Times among many, many media outlets, both old and new, covered the resignation of another media executive after his sexts with an escort were published by Business Insider. As Gawker editor-in-chief Max Read tweeted: “given the chance gawker will always report on married c-suite executives of major media companies fucking around on their wives.”

Read’s words were not just a display of bravado but an accurate reflection of how Gawker operates.

goole
Posted: July 17, 2015 at 2:24:34 PM
the opening paragraphs of greenwald's piece are a fair summary if you don't want to go the article itself

does gg not understand that blackmail actually requires the info to remain secret? like the point is not to out the person but to get money

this is not a comment on the central issue just on greenwalds take

tbh i don't see a damn thing remotely homophobic about the piece

― got bent (mild cheezed off vibes) (s.clover),

then you are a really dense person that doesn't understand the world around them. try reading the dozen articles pointing out exactly why if you can't wrap your head around it.

That's the key. Maybe this is a story worth telling (it isn't!), maybe it isn't (that's what I said!), but J0rdan and max chose the wrong side here. Instead of turning it into a blind item about a small-time escort/porn actor trying to blackmail an unnamed media exec, they facilitated a blackmail attempt. Good journalisming, guys!

xxp There's no contradiction there; the escort may have foolishly believed - j0rdan may have encouraged him to believe - he could keep Gawker from running the story if Geithner acquiesced. The Gawker story's phrasing of how the coming story publication was revealed to the victim ("Ryan believed that David deserved to know he had gone to the press" iirc?) was very likely disingenuous and self-serving.

they did not facilitate a blackmail attempt it is impossible to blackmail someone w public info cmon ppl

you could even say they did him a favor by making it public so now he can't be blackmailed anymore

don't see how publishing the story and making public the private information, the confidentiality of which the blackmailer's whole blackmail ploy hinged on, facilitates the blackmail attempt tbh

How was any of this public info before last night? Anyway, I guess the definition of blackmail involves monetary gain, so it wasn't blackmail. It was something, though. Extortion I suppose.

iirc that's the post-blackmail phase, the revealing of details to the public after the attempt fails

was there actually a "help my housing claim or I publish all this" statement made at any point? tbh this seems more like spite

oh god we got to the "is it reeeally blackmail" part

so they aired out the 'ruin a guy's life' part of the scheme w/o delivering on the 'do what i want' part for the extorter

i mean unless tim geithner is still gonna go talk to the HUD chair in the next couple days, i guess we don't know do we

he'd better, these guys are serious

they already fired a warning shot

my opinion fwiw (which = 0 but w/e) is like, how would it even occur to someone to pursue this story let alone write it let alone print it - moral issues aside it's quite obviously journalistic suicide in a really straight-up blatant regard - like, how could they be so stupid, it's baffling

^this, wondering if m bison was a prophet when he posted about max and j0rd not working there anymore

btw is there another summary i cant read all greenwalds hyperventilating adjectives and not knowing what blackmail is

This afternoon, Ryan reached out to Geithner, because he felt Geithner deserved to know that he had gone to the press. He didn’t receive a response until after I contacted Geithner for a statement, at which point Geithner texted Ryan and asked him to call immediately

Later, Ryan tells me, Geithner promised him that if he could get Gawker to kill the story, Geithner would bring his HUD complaint to President Obama.

This is worded coyly but it just as plausibly reads "active participation in the still-hopeful extortion" as "publication of results of failed extortion," probably moreso.

all dude wanted was a professional dicking down in his hotel room, he really didn't deserve this. i mean, we've all been there, haven't we?

no point equivocating here. they made a mistake. accept it, learn from it & move on.

Here is how New York law defines larceny by extortion (this was also the model for the federal Hobbs Act):

A person obtains property by extortion when he compels or induces another person to deliver such property to himself or to a third person by means of instilling in him a fear that, if the property is not so delivered, the actor or another will: [...] (v) Expose a secret or publicize an asserted fact, whether true or false, tending to subject some person to hatred, contempt or ridicule; or [...] (ix) Perform any other act which would not in itself materially benefit the actor but which is calculated to harm another person materially with respect to his health, safety, business, calling, career, financial condition, reputation or personal relationships.

how could they be so stupid, it's baffling

I felt that way too, especially when I read how shocked the Gawker people were. I think it's a convergence of:

-Gawker has outed public figures in the past
-Gawker cover the nyc media scene, and this guy is an executive at a powerful company
-Gawker believes everyone at a certain wealth level is a celebrity and therefore does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy

So Geithner seemed like fair game, even though to most anyone outside of Gawker he seems like a private citizen and outing random people is a practice with a disgusting history.