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Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is seeking to protect his personal social media accounts from being sold in the upcoming auction of his Infowars media platform to pay more than $1 billion he owes relatives of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, claiming selling those accounts would violate his privacy and deny him a chance to make a fresh start after bankruptcy.

The trustee overseeing the liquidation and selloff of the assets of Infowars and its parent company Free Speech Systems, asked a federal judge on Friday to include the social media accounts as part of the auctions scheduled for November and December. The judge delayed a decision on the matter for at least a week.

Jones’ lawyers argue the personal media accounts that use his real name are not owned by Infowars or FSS, but are controlled by him personally, and should be considered part of his “persona” that cannot be owned by someone other than himself.

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[-] TachyonTele@lemm.ee 4 points 2 hours ago

Everyone is missing the best part of the article:

and his video game “Alex Jones NWO Wars” released in 2023, that features Jones as the hero in a shooting game.

[-] x00z@lemmy.world 10 points 11 hours ago

Fuck this guy.

But his personal social media account? What the fuck is that

[-] Etterra@lemmy.world 4 points 13 hours ago

Cry some more crocodile tears ya no-neck freak.

[-] OhStopYellingAtMe@lemmy.world 85 points 1 day ago

Ruin his life. Destroy everything he has. Make him reap what he sowed.

[-] FenrirIII@lemmy.world 13 points 22 hours ago

Justice boner

[-] ryven@lemmy.dbzer0.com 32 points 1 day ago

So fuck Alex Jones, but I really don't think it's a good idea to force people to sell their accounts so that other people can impersonate them. It's just inviting social engineering attacks.

[-] FauxPseudo@lemmy.world 33 points 18 hours ago

Except in this case, much like with Trump, His business and his person were deeply intertwined. So the account is a business asset. And as such, it is subject to being an asset of the company. Maybe he should have separated them at some point.

[-] Joeffect@lemmy.world 15 points 1 day ago

Isn't it against the tos to sell your account?

[-] partial_accumen@lemmy.world 12 points 17 hours ago

If the Wendys burger chain was sold, there would be no problem with the new owner taking the Wendys social media accounts. In this case Jones has long used his social media accounts as part of his business. They're part of the Infowars assets so they can and should be handed over to debtors to settle the claims against Infowars.

[-] Joeffect@lemmy.world 1 points 3 hours ago

Yeah well Wendy's would be owned by the company not a person... You need some kind of legal distinction between the two...

So if Wendy's sold the account to a non Wendy's person that would be different than it being used by a different person within the company... I'm sure most social media companies have a distinction for business accounts.

And if they can close any account if they choose...

[-] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 5 points 15 hours ago

Law trumps TOS so it really doesn't matter what it says.

[-] unrelatedkeg@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 14 hours ago

But is there any precedent in selling accounts due to a court decision? Does the social media company get to close the account due to the TOS violation?

In any case, if it does get sold, it'll create an interesting situation.

[-] Hugh_Jeggs@lemm.ee 19 points 1 day ago

Yes but you can just tell everyone the attacks never happened, for attention

[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 37 points 1 day ago

They argue that trustee Christopher Murray does not have a right to the social media accounts as property that can be sold, and warned that a purchaser could face lawsuits as to whether they were rightfully obtained.

I'd like to buy it and start posting LGBTQ-positive content. I'm not part of the coalition. I just think it'd be fun to watch people react.

Jones is appealing the civil jury verdicts, citing free speech rights and questioning whether the families proved any connection between his comments and the people who harassed and threatened the relatives. He has since acknowledged that the shooting did happen.

Yeah, Margie TG just happened to follow a kid shouting at him for being part of a coverup and recording it on her phone be coincidence. It's not because she gets her talking points from this asshole.

[-] turbowafflz@lemmy.world 17 points 21 hours ago

I want john oliver to buy all of his stuff and run his own show with it that would be so funny

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 46 points 1 day ago

Hmm...

Yeah...

Get fucked.

[-] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 43 points 1 day ago

I'm sending thoughts and prayers for his utter fucking destruction

[-] mipadaitu@lemmy.world 21 points 1 day ago

What's stopping him from just making infowars2?

His rage is his commodity, so I don't get why he can't just start up a new channel and just do the exact same thing.

[-] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 19 points 1 day ago

What's stopping him from just making infowars2?

The law, basically. Taking his assets elsewhere to "hide" them from his creditors constitutes fraud.

He even tried to already, but that was shot down by the judge, who made him swear under oath to not try that again. Which he already IS doing, very blatantly.

[-] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 3 points 15 hours ago

That's not what they're suggesting, I'm pretty sure. They're saying, after selling all the stuff, just start up a new company with the same schtick. Alex Jones is free to still be Alex Jones. And that's all Info Wars really is/was.

[-] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 7 points 14 hours ago

With what money? He owes much more than the combined worth of his personal and business assets. Any significantly similar new company he would found would be under water in debt from the start.

He's banking on a far right billionaire or organization buying Infowars and keeping him on as an employee, because that's the only way he can keep doing it.

[-] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 3 points 9 hours ago

🤷 That's a different question.

[-] catloaf@lemm.ee 29 points 1 day ago

They also seized his bank accounts and production equipment.

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 24 points 1 day ago

That said, I wouldn't exactly be shocked if his sycophantic fans got together and built him a studio and gave him a salary.

[-] ThePantser@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago

Or a new patreon account and he would be rolling in money again. But I sure hope he keeps trying because until his debt is settled they are gonna keep taking from him.

[-] Krzd@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

I doubt all his equip etc. will be enough to cover the 1 billion. So any and all patreon income could be confiscated as well.

[-] ThePantser@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

That's what I meant by I hope he keeps trying so it can be taken as well.

[-] Krzd@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

Yeah, no idea how I didn't read that part 😅🤦

[-] ElJefe@lemm.ee 3 points 1 day ago

Unfortunately that’s not a far fetched possibility.

[-] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

He would still be in arrears for this judgement , as the seizures and auctions won’t actually cover all of the award. So, Infowars 2 would just be taken as well.

[-] Carrolade@lemmy.world 17 points 1 day ago

We should all pitch in some cash to buy them and use them to start posting pro-Fediverse, pro-FOSS and privacy-related stuff.

Yeah, it might bring in some crazies, but the Fediverse can handle that better than most places.

[-] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)
[-] Dainterhawk999@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

𝙂𝙚𝙣𝙚𝙫𝙖 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙫𝙞𝙣𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚 𝙩𝙤 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙘𝙪𝙚.

[-] cynar@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago

Don't commit war crimes. Instead, be the reason they became crimes!

[-] Carrolade@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago

Their interactions with .grad would be priceless. lol Not that they wouldn't instantly defed each other.

[-] subignition@fedia.io 7 points 1 day ago

It would be nice if some nonprofit got them and rebranded to "DisinfoWars" to post critical thinking resources and deconstruct disinformation

[-] Atelopus-zeteki@fedia.io 4 points 1 day ago

I really like this idea. Transform what he built into a force for good.

[-] unmagical@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 day ago

What's the worst that can happen? Someone buys it and starts hawking boner pills? Yeah, that ain't exactly gonna ruin his good name.

[-] Dashi@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Think bigger, someone gets the accounts and releases all of his private messages. If he doesn't delete them. I'm on the fence about the precident this would set.

[-] Burninator05@lemmy.world 2 points 8 hours ago

Deleting them could be seen as intentionally diminishing the value of the asset before auction and get him in more trouble.

[-] JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 day ago

It'd be pretty fun if some org with opposite political leanings bought the account.

[-] FauxPseudo@lemmy.world 4 points 18 hours ago

I'm hoping that the important assets get sold to the Knowledge Fight podcast. They'd be the ones able to do the most good with them.

[-] bitchkat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Even his only fans?

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this post was submitted on 26 Oct 2024
299 points (97.8% liked)

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