Peter Thiel’s Self-Serving New York Times Column; The Atlantic, 8/16/16

Adrienne LaFrance, The Atlantic; Peter Thiel’s Self-Serving New York Times Column:

"Peter Thiel has no regrets about pouring millions of dollars of his own money into the legal fight that bankrupted Gawker Media. “I am proud to have contributed financial support,” Thiel wrote in The New York Times on Monday, “… and I would gladly support someone else in the same position.”...

“The press is too important to let its role be undermined by those who would search for clicks at the cost of the profession’s reputation,” Thiel wrote for the Times this week. What he seems not to understand is that freedom of the press means that editorial decisions are made in newsrooms, not by venture capitalists or presidential candidates hellbent on revenge. Thiel could have “fought speech with speech,” instead of with $10 million, Marcus Wohlsen wrote for Wired in June. “In seeking to destroy Gawker, Thiel showed that what matters to him isn’t freedom but the raw exercise of power.”

And in writing for the Times this week, Thiel showed that he’s not as concerned with protecting privacy as he is with serving up a narrative that he believes justifies his actions."

Gawker's downfall is a 'scary prospect for journalists'; Washington Post, 8/19/16

[Video] Paul Farhi and Margaret Sullivan, Washington Post; Gawker's downfall is a 'scary prospect for journalists' :

"The news and gossip site Gawker.com is shuttering after a lengthy court battle with former professional wrestling star Hulk Hogan, who was secretly backed by Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel. The Post's Margaret Sullivan and Paul Farhi look at Gawker's legacy and how this could be a dangerous precedent for news critics."

Bankrupting Gawker over a grudge isn't justice. It's censorship; Guardian, 6/10/16

Nicky Woolf, Guardian; Bankrupting Gawker over a grudge isn't justice. It's censorship:

"But Hogan’s is not the only lawsuit against Gawker that Thiel has been secretly backing.

He has a genuine grievance. But the fact that an unaccountable billionaire has been able to weaponize his wealth, in absolute secrecy, to game the American legal system using puppet claimants to turn thumbscrews on reporters and media companies – do so repeatedly, backing suit after suit: that is something which should terrify us all. Not just fans of Gawker. Not just journalists. All of us.

It is the media’s job to hold the powerful to account. Gawker and its other sites – Gizmodo, Jezebel and so on – are an important part of that landscape. Just last month, it was Gizmodo who spoke to newsfeed curators at Facebook – a company for which Thiel was the first outside investor – and revealed the human hands behind the supposedly algorithmic trending topics feed."