What more bullying can Thiel et seq. do

["Dave Farber" <dave () farber net>]

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: David Richardson <dsrich () dsrich net>
Date: Sat, Nov 5, 2016 at 2:31 PM
Subject: What more bullying can Thiel et seq. do
To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>


I know this has probably been discussed in one form or another, but I
haven't seen it, so I will ask the IP list with your permission, Prof.
Farber.

TL;DR: My ignorance of the law and precedent surrounding the Thiel
victories recently is showing, so I am asking for opinions and guidance
going forward.

With Thiel yet again proving for the court system what Trump has rubbed
our noses in with his success in the political arena - that both are
completely fact free zones - I am concerned about some other aspects of
the situation.  Thiel basically "took out" Gawker Media because they
dared to make comments critical of him, and he did it with enough legal
firepower to reduce facts to irrelevance.  Every time this happens, I
get a chill down my spine.

The sorts of things I am worried about in the aftermath of this
apparently legal revenge killing are things like can whoever owns the
pieces of Gawker start suing anybody who commented on the obvious
falsehood that was the E-mail origin claim - can they go after anybody
who commented on that using the initial case as "We proved we were
right" for legal bullying of the rest of us who knew better and
commented as well?  Note that this is not a personal concern, but the
possibility is scary.

In the more general case of a company bankruptcy, what obligations is
the new owner under in regards to the existing customer base?  Can they
just sell they list to spammers to make a quick buck?  Is the new owner
under any legal obligation to protect any customer data, like credit
cards, etc. that came with the defunct company?  What about secondary,
non paying customers involved, like people who make comments and the
like?  Quite a number of sites require personal data in order to make
comments, i.e. no anonymous posting - is that data free game, or is the
new owner under obligations there?  I would assume that there is some
case law in that area from the number of newspapers that have gone out
of business over the years, but would that case law apply here?

Thanks,

David Richardson



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