Sale!

Conspiracy: Hulk Hogan v Gawker

Ryan Holiday

$64.95

For years, Thiel had searched endlessly for a solution to what he’d come to call the “Gawker Problem.” When an unmarked envelope delivered an illegally recorded sex tape of Hogan with his best friend’s wife, Gawker had seen the chance for millions of pageviews and to say the things that others were afraid to say. Thiel saw their publication of the tape as the opportunity he was looking for. He would come to pit Hogan against Gawker in a multi-year proxy war through the Florida legal system, while Gawker remained confidently convinced they would prevail as they had over so many other lawsuits – until it was too late.

In stock

SKU: 14-694 Category:

Description

This trial presents one of the most difficult First Amendment issues of our time. Gawker, a website that specialized in disclosing embarrassing information about celebrities, placed on its website a sex tape of Hulk Hogan, whose encounter with a woman was secretly filmed by her husband. The framers of the First Amendment certainly did not have in mind protecting the publication of a sex tape made without the consent of one of the participants. Indeed, Justice Louis Brandeis, a staunch defender of the First Amendment, made his name as a young lawyer by writing an influential law review article about the need to protect the privacy of individuals against the excesses of an exploitive press. The result was a verdict in the amount of $115 million dollars, effectively putting Gawker out of business.

The specific First Amendment issues presented in the Hulk Hogan case seem destined to continually resurface in different contexts, as many states enact anti-revenge porn statutes or criminalize the publication of sex tapes without the consent of one of the participants. This difficult constitutional issue has yet to be tested in the Supreme Court. When it is, they will have to strike the appropriate balance between competing constitutional issues.

Additional information

Weight 1.13 lbs
Dimensions 6.5 × 9.5 × 1 in