Stories that could be challenged in the courts are going unpublished or hiding behind paywalls, writes Mike Masnick in techdirt, October 17, 2017. He claims the “Gawker effect” is responsible as publishers run scared after the March 2016 $140 million award for Hulk Hogan in his defamation lawsuit against Gawker Media for running a tape of him having sex with his best friend’s wife.
Reporter Kim Masters, Columbia Journalism Review, October 13, 2017, writes that she had difficulties finding someone to publish her article alleging that Amazon executive Roy Price sexually harassed one of his producers. Before finding a home for the story, Masters talked with six publications with three conducting legal review. Eventually The Hollywood Reporter picked up the piece and Amazon suspended Price soon after.
The New York Times ran a story after the Hulk Hogan verdict that cited legal experts in their opinion that the award was unlikely to chill press freedoms. Law professor Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky points out that few publishers would ever run a graphic sex tape without a compelling public interest reason. She said in that way the verdict is limited, but it could still give media outlets pause in publishing details of sexual improprieties. (The New York Times, March 19, 2017, by Erik Eckholm)
For earlier FAC coverage of the Gawker effect click here and here.