#New gawker pro

“Technology can have positive and negative aspects,” he told Silicon Valley Weekly in a 2009 sitdown. Thiel is behind the Committee for Protection of Journalists, which bills itself as “an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to the global defense of press freedom.” Thiel, a libertarian who has supported Ted Cruz and has pledged to back Donald Trump as one of California’s appointed delegates, has long been a vocal advocate for the freedom of the press.

Thiel, an early investor in Facebook and the co-founder of PayPal, has since become a vocal critic of Valleywag, which he has called “the Silicon Valley equivalent of Al Qaeda.” Thiel told PEHub in 2009, “I think they should be described as terrorists, not as writers or reporters.” He would come out publicly three years after the original story was published. According to the New York Times, the case was being privately funded by venture capitalist Peter Thiel, who was outed by Valleywag - Gawker’s Silicon Valley-centric blog - in a 2007 post. Hogan, however, was reportedly not alone in bringing suit against Gawker. Since the post went live in 2012, it has been viewed 7.5 million times. As Hogan would testify in court, he was not aware the encounter was being recorded. Four years ago, the website published a tape of Hogan engaging in intercourse with Heather Clem, the ex-wife of his former best friend.

#New gawker pro

In March, former pro wrestler Hulk Hogan was awarded $115 million - with an extra $25.1 million in punitive damages - by a Florida jury in a civil case against Gawker Media. The website’s co-founders Jake Horowitz and Chris Altchek are now employees of Bustle Digital Group.Gawker’s history of outing closeted gay public figures may have cost the company $140 million. In addition to Gawker, Goldberg picked up Mic.com last November, as well, after the website ran out of money and was forced to lay off their entire editorial staff. Unlike many competitors, the company and its flagship website are in the black and Goldberg himself has developed something of a reputation for buying distressed media properties like Elite Daily and turning them around. With brutal layoffs taking a bite out of BuzzFeed, HuffPost and Gannett this week, Goldberg’s Bustle empire has increasingly emerged as a successful outlier. We do so through official and legal channels,” Goldberg told TheWrap in response to his former writer’s concerns. “Any time an employee makes a claim about workplace behavior, we take it seriously and look as deeply into it as we can. Among the complaints were Griffith’s jokes about poor people, speculation about the penis size of a notable businessman, and taking a “dismissive stance towards the recruiting of a writer who identifies as non-binary,” per the Beast.Īlso Read: New Gawker Media Owner Bryan Goldberg Eyes 2019 Relaunch Goldberg paid $1.35 million for the property.ĭisagreements with Griffith played a direct role in the departure of Gawker 2.0’s only two staff writers, Maya Kosoff and Anna Breslaw, as first reported in the Daily Beast on Wednesday.

The site had been in limbo for years after a lawsuit brought by Hulk Hogan bankrupted its former parent company Gawker Media. Goldberg, the CEO of Bustle Digital Group, purchased at an auction in July 2018. The company declined to comment on whether any disciplinary action had been taken against Griffith or whether she would continue to remain as editorial director. Griffith didn’t immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment. The tweets in question have since been taken down, but Splinter captured a number of screen shots. I hope the asian are as good at throwing water on my face as they are at doing nails.”Īlso Read: Gawker Media Sold to Bustle Founder Bryan Goldberg in Bankruptcy Auction Racially-charged tweets dating back as far as 2010 include Griffith commenting about the temperature a nail salon, writing, “This nail salon is so hot i might pass out. “As I’ve stated before, we are many months away from the re-launch, and we are going to continue to say absolutely nothing about the product until we are ready.” That’s certainly not the direction Gawker will go,” Goldberg told TheWrap in response to an emailed inquiry. Those tweets absolutely do not reflect the company’s values. “Nobody at our company, myself included, condoned or stood behind the tweets. Gawker chief Bryan Goldberg offered a public finger wag to the site’s newly-hired editorial director Carson Griffith, telling TheWrap he did not condone earlier tweets from Griffith that were dredged up by Splinter, many of which complained about her maid or used racially insensitive language.