In 2012, he hired Charles Harder (now the attorney for President Donald Trump) to begin filing cases against Gawker, the first of which was a $100 million dollar lawsuit on behalf of Terry Bollea (AKA Hulk Hogan), after Gawker published a stolen sex tape of the former professional wrestler.įor the next several years this case, and a few others, wound their way through the legal system without much fanfare. If I may review: Starting in 2011, Thiel began researching and covertly funding litigation aimed at the “destruction” of Gawker, in retaliation for outing him as gay and for what he believed was the generally cruel and bullying coverage of the site. Conspicuously absent at the auction will be the two clashing personalities who brought it there, Gawker founder and owner Nick Denton, and the billionaire Peter Thiel, who orchestrated the secret, nearly decade-long conspiracy against Gawker that killed it. Gawker’s sale will mark the symbolic end of the bankruptcy-induced purgatory where the former independent media brand has spent the last 24 months. Will it be purchased as some kind of relic of a bygone era of the internet? Possessed by a philanthropist or a sworn enemy? Will an upstart publisher try to turn it into something new? Will a major media empire buy it and try to put flesh back on the bones and revive the corpse?

The auction in the offices of Ropes & Gray LLP in New York City for the remains of Gawker-which include more than 50 domain names, an archive of some 200,000 articles, a handful of social media accounts with roughly 2 million combined followers, the copyright to a book published in 2007, Gawker’s trademarks and some miscellaneous sub-blogs-will determine what’s to become of the fallen blogging powerhouse. On Thursday, July 12, a locker containing the bones of -killed in action, as it were, for its publication of a fully nude sextape of the wrestler Hulk Hogan-will be up for auction to the highest bidder. The sale of Gawker’s remaining assets is essentially the last remaining piece of business between all parties. After Univision purchased Gawker Media, Hulk Hogan became the largest creditor of Gawker’s bankruptcy estate.

Ryan holiday peter thiel