Gawker Claims Video Exists of Rob Ford Smoking Crack

[MattRoxx]

I am quite comfortable knowing that my views are based on facts, facts reported in most of our major newspapers.

You will have to content yourself with being a loon who thinks there's a giant conspiracy spanning multiple media organizations. Enjoy.

What's funny is that multiple media organizations have conspired against Ford. Or, conspired in favour of disclosure and the truth, depending on your point of view.

Project Traveller: Gang sweep search warrant documents to stay secret until Aug. 27
A judge calls the Crown’s request for 6 months “unjustified” after the Star and other media ask to have documents unsealed that may link gang raids to Mayor Rob Ford.
Information used to obtain a search warrant executed as part of a Toronto gang sweep that may have ties to Mayor Rob Ford will be kept secret until after Aug. 27, a judge ruled Tuesday.
The Star is seeking to have documents unsealed that relate to a search warrant executed as part of the year-long Project Traveller, arguing that information that may relate to Ford is in the public interest.
Ontario Court Justice Philip Downes ruled the information used to get that search warrant will first be made available solely to the media’s lawyers by Aug. 27.
That version will have some portions censored by the Crown, which must also provide reasons for keeping those sections secret.

Since the Star filed its application, other media outlets, including the Globe and Mail, CTV and CBC, jointly filed a similar application to have the warrant made public.

 

[diehard]

__________//

 

[Phil C. McNasty]

Gawker's credibility quickly falling apart:

http://betabeat.com/2013/07/exposin...-how-blogs-will-print-anything-for-pageviews/

Exposing the Racket: A Simple Stunt Reveals How Blogs Will Print Anything for Pageviews

It doesn’t take Noam Chomsky to see that the state of media is bad.

But in 2011, I had the sense that most people didn’t fully grasp the absurd lows the system was spiraling toward. So I set out to illustrate it.

And in the process surprised even myself.

When I sold my first book of media criticism to Portfolio/Penguin, I decided to use the launch itself as an experiment. I even wrote some of the experiment into my book proposal and subsequent deal.

It went like this: I would grossly exaggerate the size of my book advance in a press release and let the gossip mill take this number and run with it. I would encourage bloggers and reporters to speculate that it was a celebrity tell-all about high-profile clients of mine like Dov Charney and Tucker Max. In effect, I’d be using the media’s weakness for sensationalism to get them to expose their weakness for sensationalism (and give coverage to my indictment of them, something they’d otherwise be reluctant to do).

It was a lot simpler to execute than you’d expect. All it took was writing in my announcement that the book had been acquired in a “major deal.” This was quickly picked up by the publishing industry blog GalleyCat, which immediately interpreted this to mean my advance was $500,000. (I cannot actually disclose my advance, but I’ll say it was large enough to buy a house, just not THAT nice of a house).

Then I sent an anonymous tip to Jezebel with the link. Within minutes they ran a piece that was so poorly researched that they actually thought Dov Charney was the one writing the book. Sensing blood, I emailed Gawker reporter Hamilton Nolan under the fake name “Mindy Vasquez” (registered with Gmail minutes before) and wondered aloud why a publisher would offer $500k for such a book unless there was “major dirt on a celeb.”

I emailed Hamilton as Mindy at 1:46 pm. At 1:55 pm he emailed me, Ryan Holiday, at my American Apparel email address, having so shamelessly followed the lead of an unsubstantiated tip and asked of the advance: “That’s a big number, which would seem to indicate it’s a tell all book. True?”

I replied, “No comment.”

His story appeared shortly after: “Tucker Max and Dov Charney, Together in a Single Book.” That post did 40,000 page views.

This is all it takes to create a major online story, one that was picked up by dozens of media outlets and generated hundreds and hundreds of comments. The kind of story that to this day makes people think I was paid a half a million for my debut book. (Let me tell you, people are quite nice when they think you suddenly come into that kind of money.)

If you were ever wondering how the sausage gets made, well, this is it.

There is a great line from Thucydides, “So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand.” Well, today, people are paid to do that. And they call themselves journalists without a hint of self-awareness.

Only one outlet actually bothered to do any research and get their hands on this book proposal, in which I, you know, explained exactly what I was doing, and had freely distributed all over town. That outlet was the New York Observer (at the time, we had no affiliation). But when the Observer made it obvious how embarrassingly wrong these blogs had been, did any of them bother to change their story?

Of course not!

I’m not bragging. I don’t really think the stunt is all that funny. I bring it up to make clear just how easy it is to manipulate the media, how they are negligent to the point of being complicit, just how willing major websites are to accept dubious sources or gossipy stories.

It’s worth asking, “Why?” Why does this system work this way? One reason is that the process is mostly obscured from the reading public, which is why I felt that my stunt was the only way to illustrate it. The second reason is greed. In a system in which profit is determined by clicks and pageviews–and those things can’t be undone, even if the story turns out to be bogus later–bloggers have no real motivation to publish the truth. I like Nick Denton as a person. It’s just the incentives he’s set up that are toxic.

Having known all this–how Gawker and other blogs source their stories–the last year or so has been rather interesting for me, because I have watched as these same blogs were responsible for reporting on major news stories that had serious news implications.

In the last few months alone, Gawker broke the story that Michael Arrington had possibly raped a woman.

Gawker broke the news that there was supposedly a video of Toronto mayor Rob Ford smoking crack.

And so I observed the rest of the media following their lead on these stories, never questioning the motives, never looking into the method. Perhaps Gawker will end up being right about these stories. But if they are, it may have more to do with broken clocks being occasionally correct than it will with earnest journalism.

A long time ago, Gen. Smedley Butler defined a racket as something that “is not what it seems to the majority of the people,” where only a small group of insiders know what’s really going on and they operate for the benefit of a few and expense of basically everyone else.

It’s become clear to me that this is the only definition of the online-driven media system of today: a racket.

A racket where investors and media moguls make millions, where individual bloggers driven by pageview bonuses exaggerate and distort the news for their share of the bounty, where promoters using tactics like mine can generate massive publicity for free, and readers–having no idea that this is occurring–click away, think they are receiving “news.”

The ultimate irony of my experiences launching this book–and I’m not complaining because it has done well for me–was watching the media contort itself to explain away what I exposed. Just last week, the same Hamilton Nolan wrote an article that called me a liar. I suppose cognitive dissonance (and a guilty conscience) explains that–why someone who will literally publish anything that lands in his inbox would want to be aggressive about making sure that other people are labeled as dishonest. Rackets have to be protected after all.

But it has been sad to watch. Not that I expected one book to change everything; I’m not some rosy-glasses idealist. I just figured things might get a little bit better, rather than much much worse. I thought certain media outlets might take steps to close the loopholes that allowed fake news through. My mistake was hoping that they were as disgusted with the racket as I was.

Even after I explained how all this worked, even after I revealed my personal playbook (and the media games that others play), no one in the media did anything about it on purpose. They dove head first into the stories I mentioned earlier, excoriating the likes of Michael Arrington for heinous crimes despite preposterously sketchy evidence. And as Gawker editor John Cook was forced to admit when Gawker was unable to produce the Rob Ford video that they’d gotten millions of pageviews from and taken $200,000 of reader’s money for, “Our decision to publish was informed by [a] desire to get ahead of any rival stories that the gossip mill might generate.”

Oh, OK.

There have been countless more stories–less serious but still sad–driven by this impulse. Not just by Gawker but by every blog, newspaper and television station. From Sean Parker’s $10M ecological disaster that appears to have been utterly misreported by every blog on the internet, to the Michael Douglas “I got HPV from oral sex” story that everyone was laughing at (even though what he was saying was actually correct). These are the stories that they use to make money, at the expense of you and everyone else.

It’s easy to forget the costs of all this. We may not have much sympathy for someone wealthy and with an abundance of personality like Sean Parker, which I understand. But should we really identify with and support the people who attack him solely to enrich themselves? People who could give two shits about whether their story turns out to be completely and utterly incorrect down the road (even though that’s pretty much the main part of their job)?

I wanted to wait to come out with this until now. So, free from the confusion of the event itself (of course I chose the week of my paperback release because that’s my job) I could make it utterly clear how embarrassingly and easily the media will fall over itself to report basically anything. How free publicity for a book or a person or cause is as simple as a fake email. Or worse–that bloggers will invent the news themselves if it serves their interests.

It’s obvious who is doing the lying here. It’s time we ask ourselves: What are we going to do about it? When are we going to see this racket for what it is?

 

[Butler1000]

And with the Star bleeding readership as well.....

 

[Phil C. McNasty]

Gawker apparently doesnt pay their interns:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-...interns-sue-after-fox-searchlight-ruling.html

Gawker’s Unpaid Interns Sue After Fox Searchlight Ruling

Gawker Media LLC was sued by unpaid interns who allege the online publisher violated minimum-wage law, days after a federal judge ruled in a similar case that interns at Fox Searchlight Pictures Inc. should have been paid.

In the Gawker case, filed yesterday in Manhattan federal court, three former interns said they each spent at least 15 hours a week working on blogs affiliated with the New York media company and were “not paid a single cent.”

“Gawker employs numerous other ‘interns’ in the same way, paying them nothing or underpaying them and utilizing their services to publish its content on the Internet, an enterprise that generates significant amounts of revenue for Gawker,” the plaintiffs said in the complaint, which was filed on behalf of all of the company’s unpaid interns.

The lawsuit, which also names company founder Nick Denton as a defendant, seeks unpaid wages and overtime. Representatives for Gawker didn’t respond to a request for comment.

U.S. District Judge William H. Pauley in Manhattan this month ruled in the Fox Searchlight case that unpaid internships must adhere to U.S. Labor Department criteria to be exempt from minimum wage requirements.
1947 Ruling

Under those factors, which are based on a 1947 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the position must be structured for the intern’s benefit and shouldn’t displace regular workers. The employer also shouldn’t derive immediate advantages from the intern’s activities.

The former Fox Searchlight interns alleged they were asked to perform routine errands and other tasks for the movie maker, such as making deliveries, organizing file cabinets, making photocopies and taking lunch orders. Though menial, the work was “essential,” Pauley wrote, and they should have been paid.

The Gawker interns alleged that they performed tasks for the blogs including writing, researching, editing, promoting articles on social media and moderating comment forums.

“We filed this case because Gawker was breaking the law, and the company was taking advantage of young people who really have no bargaining power,” Andrea M. Paparella, a lawyer for the Gawker interns, said in a phone interview yesterday. “Of course, the Fox decision is a good thing.”

 

[simon482]

it's funny that you were thinking that gawker was credible at some point.

 

[Phil C. McNasty]

it`s funny that you were thinking that gawker was credible at some point

Fuji did, not me. Fuji refers to Gawker as just one of the multiple newspapers:

Correct. However, multiple news papers reporting it as fact does tend to make it true

I always referred to Gawker as a gossip site: https://terb.cc/vbulletin/showthrea...moking-Crack&p=4550970&viewfull=1#post4550970

No, we can agree that 2 reporters and one gossip site saw what they think was Ford smoking something out of a pipe

Another: https://terb.cc/vbulletin/showthrea...moking-Crack&p=4548596&viewfull=1#post4548596

And another: https://terb.cc/vbulletin/showthrea...-Crack&p=4563177&highlight=gossip#post4563177

 

[boodog]

it's funny that you were thinking that gawker was credible at some point.

All I want to know is where is this Gawker, the "credible" gossip site in the minds of Rob Ford haters, going to send that $200,000 donations.

 

[simon482]

All I want to know is where is this Gawker, the "credible" gossip site in the minds of Rob Ford haters, going to send that $200,000 donations.

if it was done with kick starter and the money isn't spent on what they posted as the reason they were going to spend it in the time frame they said they would spend it, it gets returned.

 

[Nate1]

i think the only thing that is worth anything that has come out of this thread is that fuji is now forced to believe in bigfoot, nessie, aliens and ghosts.

and by default of your logic you belive their is a video tape of Rob Ford smoking crack.

 

[simon482]

and by default of your logic you belive their is a video tape of Rob Ford smoking crack.

nope. the reporters i am speaking of not only saw the video and wrote an article on it, they released the video for the public to view and make their own judgement. bigfoot reporters have way more integrity than these clowns at the star at this point.

so far bigfoot is real and rob ford smoking crack is just an urban legend.

 

[fuji]

reputable reporters saw a video and wrote a story, that is all you need for things to be real. your reporters didn't see ford smoking crack, they saw a (supposed) video. so you are now forced to believe in bigfoot and all other things i mentioned. horse's ass.

I am only forced to believe there is a video of Rob Ford purportedly smoking crack. We all know there are videos that purport to show bigfoot, that is not what you were asked for. You were asked for a reporter who has seen bigfoot. It is the existence of the video you were doubting, remember.

I agree those videos that purport to show bigfoot exist, thanks for agreeing the Ford video exists.

The Ford video could be fake like the bigfoot video but it exists in a context:

- Confirmation Ford actually at that address
- Confirmation Ford knew the video maker
- Ford frequenting a crack house
- Family connections to cocaine and drug dealing
- Prior suspicion Ford used cocaine

Oh, and Ford himself knowing the exact address where the video would be.

 

[simon482]

I am only forced to believe there is a video of Rob Ford purportedly smoking crack. We all know there are videos that purport to show bigfoot, that is not what you were asked for. You were asked for a reporter who has seen bigfoot. It is the existence of the video you were doubting, remember.

I agree those videos that purport to show bigfoot exist, thanks for agreeing the Ford video exists.

The Ford video could be fake like the bigfoot video but it exists in a context:

- Confirmation Ford actually at that address
- Confirmation Ford knew the video maker
- Ford frequenting a crack house
- Family connections to cocaine and drug dealing
- Prior suspicion Ford used cocaine

Oh, and Ford himself knowing the exact address where the video would be.

i have seen bigfoot videos, i have not seen a rob ford smoking crack video. bigfoot is real, ford smoking crack is an urban legend.

i need to see something with my own eyes to believe it is real, i am not a sheep that will accept every little nugget i am told is a fact.

 

[IM469]

Perhaps you should learn how to read a newspaper. Then you would know that all the following are facts:

Three reliable eye witnesses have seen a video of Rob Ford smoking something from a glass pipe. An unreliable witness says it was crack in the pipe.

CTV had independently found out about this video from police sources which confirms that it exists and that the Star did not simply make it up.

Ford told his staff where the video was, he gave the exact address, which further confirms that it exists and confirms that he had some involvement there to know that. It also shows he was lying when he said to the press there was no video.

Ford was photographed with the video makers, who were crack dealers, in front of a crack house, further confirming his involvement.

Eye witnesses including a local convenience store owner say he was there frequently, confirming that he frequented that crack house.

There were prior allegations of Ford using cocaine. Several people publicly speculated he was on cocaine when he grabbed Thompson's ass. This was well before anyone knew of the video.

Several of his friends and colleagues now refuse to work with him unless he checks into rehab and contrary to your claim have not said alcohol is the problem. They have also not said coke. This corroborates and confirms that there is a substance abuse problem giving context to the other information.

And his deep family connections to the drug trade go far beyond his drug dealing brother Doug, he has a convicted cocaine dealer for a brother in law and a sister who herself was a cocaine addict. Numerous family friends have cocaine convictions as well and he had frequented the house of one of them. That cocaine addiction is all around him in his private life gives context to the other information.

Would this produce a conviction in court where he is innocent unless proven guilty, no. But on a balance of probabilities basis it is enough to say he is most likely struggling with an addiction to cocaine that at least sometimes involves smoking it.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury ... my esteem prosecutor seems to mix up 'facts' with just an extraordinary set of coincidences after all, if an infinite amount of monkeys over an infinite amount of time could type a Shakespeare play - a similar set of coincidences could have befallen our innocent mayor. There is a 'fact' that the world is round instead of flat - but how many actually walked around it ? A fact is not a fact if you haven't seen it with your own eyes.

If the crack pipe doesn't fit - you must acquit !

 

[shack]

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury ... my esteem prosecutor seems to mix up 'facts' with just an extraordinary set of coincidences after all,

Fuji knows full well what facts are. He hates Ford (as he's entitled to) and as such will try to get people to accept as fact, things that even he knows aren't facts, by saying they are facts over and over again until, in fact, some people believe they are in fact fact.

Basically fuji is leading us on by making us think that he truly believes those are facts because he knows they are not but likes getting a reaction out of us.

 

[fluffy]

i have seen bigfoot videos, i have not seen a rob ford smoking crack video. bigfoot is real, ford smoking crack is an urban legend.

i need to see something with my own eyes to believe it is real, i am not a sheep that will accept every little nugget i am told is a fact.

It's a good thing most of our ancestors had more of an intellect than you do, otherwise we would still be a race of hunter-gatherers. There is no way we can see everything with our own eyes. Sometimes we have to use our brain to piece together information and draw conclusions. You should try it sometime.

 

[fuji]

i have seen bigfoot videos, i have not seen a rob ford smoking crack video. bigfoot is real, ford smoking crack is an urban legend.

i need to see something with my own eyes to believe it is real, i am not a sheep that will accept every little nugget i am told is a fact.

Let me know when you have a story running in a major newspaper. "Troll Weekly" doesn't count.

 

[fuji]

Fuji knows full well what facts are. He hates Ford (as he's entitled to) and as such will try to get people to accept as fact, things that even he knows aren't facts, by saying they are facts over and over again until, in fact, some people believe they are in fact fact.

Basically fuji is leading us on by making us think that he truly believes those are facts because he knows they are not but likes getting a reaction out of us.

I am just telling you what has been reported in multiple respected national newspapers. You can check that yourself.

That you choose to believe Ford's obvious lies rather than multiply corroborated news stories is your own personal disability.

 

[GameBoy27]

I am just telling you what has been reported in multiple respected national newspapers. You can check that yourself.

That you choose to believe Ford's obvious lies rather than multiply corroborated news stories is your own personal disability.

fuji is banking on the court of public opinion, hearsay and no physical evidence. Good enough for him, but it really doesn't prove much. Easy to connect the dots on speculation, but I think most people want a little more evidence rather than "three people watched a video on an iPhone in the back of a car" in order to make up their minds. A little proof would go a long way, one way or the other.

 

[shack]

I am just telling you what has been reported in multiple respected national newspapers. You can check that yourself.

I agree that's true. I don't however believe that you truly believe all the conjecture and innuendo that you refer to as factual. You know they are not facts but want to push your agenda of turning/keeping people's opinions against Ford.