8mo ago

Judge says he must still approve sale of Infowars to The Onion

www.nbcnews.com

Summary

A federal judge has delayed approving the sale of Alex Jones’ media company, Infowars, to The Onion, amid disputes over the auction process.

The Onion won with a $1.75 million bid supported by Sandy Hook families, who agreed to forego their share of sale proceeds for future revenue from a revamped Infowars, enabling other creditors to collect more.

However, a competing bidder backed by Jones, First United American Companies, contested the sale, claiming its $3.5 million bid was unfairly rejected.

The judge plans an evidentiary hearing to ensure transparency.

35 comments

As much as I wanted the onion to win, all I really care is that it in not going to go back to Jones.
- the only other bidder in the Infowars auction — First United American Companies, which operates the ShopAlexJones.com website
  Sounds like it's The Onion, or back to Alex Jones.
  
  He also declined to immediately rule on Jones' request for a temporary restraining order to disqualify the Onion's bid, and said "whatever was status quo pre-auction remains status quo" — essentially allowing Jones to remain broadcasting from his flagship platform, Infowars, for the time being.
  "Firing folks a week before Thanksgiving is not what we do, but it sounds like that's not what occurred," Lopez said. "Folks are continuing to work."
  It sounds like the judge is a little too concerned not to cause discomfort to Alex Jones and his Infowars employees. It doesn't sound promising for The Onion.
  
  That was my point.
- Or Leon.
You'd think if Jones pulled together 3.5 million to bid indirectly through a shell company for his own bankruptcy they'd just you know... take that money and give it to his creditors then continue with the sale since it's still not enough...
- You'd think
- Then he's got the asset again so it can be auctioned off to get more proceeds to the families.
  It's an infinite money glitch.
  
  That would be extremely funny.
More of that "free market" Republicans and Neoliberals love crowing about on display.
Can't have commerce happening for prosocial reasons, only greed!
- Can’t have commerce happening for prosocial reasons, only greed!
  i mean, if Jones is in bankruptcy the whole point is to pay his debts to who he owes, some of which i believe are the parkland families. so you want to sell it for the largest total amount in order to pay off as much debt as possible.
  if a company really did offer $3.5m and was rejected meanwhile The Onion is getting accepted for $1.75m, I'd like to know why. I don't think a company should get free dibs just because they're more or less "ethical" than another. at the end of the day, they're a for-profit corporation that is going to use this as a way to make money.
  i don't believe for one second this has anything to do with "prosociality"
  
  The major reason is that the Parkland families agreed to take a smaller payout as part of the Onion deal. Therefore, it enables more of the creditors to actually get paid (as opposed to the other deal, where the Parkland families would get almost all the money and the rest of the creditors would be left hat-in-hand).
  
  Detailed answer: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GmDNz7irGgw
  TLDW: there's two main parties (excluding lawyers and that kinda stuff) who would receive the money. As it stands right now, one of them would receive 98%, whereas the other would be left with barely anything. The Onion made a deal, that would cut into that 98%, and give the other party 100000 dollars more than what they would get with any other bid if it was shared according to the "proper" split. In return the 98% party gets paid out the rest of their due (potentially more, potentially less) with revenue from running the site.
  I watched the video when it came out. If memory serves me correctly, the 98% party are parents from North Carolina, the others are from Texas. The percentage I wrote is probably wrong too. But it's definitely a massive discrepancy. The Onion worked this deal out in collaboration with both parties, and there's definitely a prosocial aspect in the NC parents declining a large chunk od money so the other victims can get more. Though both the NC parents and The Onion could potentially earn back that amount by running the website.
  
  I think the video LegalEagle uploaded explains it quite succinctly: for the sale there was a certain split between the debtors, the debtors with the largest portion were willing to forego a portion such that the other debtors would get a larger portion if The Onion's bid was the winning one. In effect, the other debtors would get more money out of the 1.75m than the 3.5m bid, and the debtors that 'got less' are the ones that offered the money in the first place.
  
  My understanding is that the families are willing to forgive the debt to them if the onion is the purchaser. If you add the value of that to the bid, it far outweighs the 3.5 million.
Musk will probably end up buying it, buying MSNBC and renaming that to InfowarsX
- This made me nauseous only because I can actually see it happening.
- This is Muskrat we are talking about. He would clearly call it Infosecs.
- And, like twitter, promptly destroy the site.
  Musk is shit at social media and I can’t see him and Jones getting along long enough to make this purchase profitable.
Then he needs to get to it and stop kissing ass
You can't put too much water in a nuclear reactor
- Chernobyl has entered the chat

35 comments