Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue

by Ryan Holiday

Thiel is just as unprepared for it. “We didn’t think it was going to happen, so yes, we were caught by surprise.” He is caught by surprise not only by the news, but by the direction that news begins to go. Though on May 25, the hashtag #ThankYouPeter would briefly spike on Twitter—driven mostly by alt-right and Gamergate accounts—and many of his Silicon Valley colleagues would cheer the audacity of what he had pulled off, the reaction from the rest of the media was almost overwhelmingly negative. The revelation of Peter’s name immediately flips the narrative that many reporters and commenters had been running with. Now all of a sudden, it wasn’t Gawker, the bully, beating up on Hulk Hogan, it was a megalomaniacal billionaire threatening free speech. The idea that Gawker could have perhaps quite handily prevailed at trial with a better legal strategy was immediately replaced by the perception that Gawker never had a chance.

Ridiculous resulting