🏛️ Dominion's $1.6B defamation claim against Fox fails the actual-malice test
Sacks' legal read of the Murdoch deposition: Dominion cannot win because New York Times v. Sullivan requires actual malice, and Murdoch admitted everything except that - he conceded Fox platformed claims it knew or should have known were false, but said the motive was fear of losing audience to a rival network, i.e. greed, which is a complete defense. So Fox escapes the liability the headlines imply, and even a guilty finding would not support $1.6B of damages.
0
CONVICTION
peaked 35.0 EMBER
DORMANT
band · contested
▲ LONG FOXA
expression · bullish politics-market
WRONG
result · return -15.1% · vs SPY -43.9%
2024-03-03
born 2023-03-03 (E118) → window closed
⚖ Why this result
fully deterministic — computed from daily closes on the scoring date; nothing below is editable or hand-set
- Window: 2023-03-03 → 2024-03-03 — first mention + 12-month horizon, then the window locks.
- The call: ▲ LONG FOXA (primary play). FOXA fell 15.1% over the window → return (sign flipped for a SHORT) = -15.1% (the call lost money).
- Benchmark: holding SPY over the same window returned +28.8% → vs SPY = -15.1 − (+28.8) = -43.9% — what this call made or lost against just owning the index. This is the number the result uses.
- Rule fired:
· RIGHT — return ≥ +10% AND beat SPY by 5+· HALF — return ≥ +5% OR beat SPY at all▶ WRONG — everything else
- Credit: supporters of a WRONG earn 0 each, opposers the opposite — this feeds the scoreboard. supported: nobody | opposed: Chamath, Sacks
Conviction timeline
bands: green ≥ 65 · watch ≥ 45 · ember ≥ 15
Plays vs SPY · % since first mention (2023-03-03)
Plays
Mention log newest first
Chamath
politics-market 51% · n=95
· E125 (2023-04-21) · explicit_prediction · strength 3
▶ 32:48
OPPOSE
“Fox, I think, has only 4 billion of cash, so they just spent 20 some odd percent of it paying this off. And if I were a shareholder, the question I would ask is did we actually make enough money to justify having to pay almost $800 million of our cash balance? The answer is probably no. And this is the first of a bunch of lawsuits that they have.”
Sacks
politics-market 48% · n=87
· E125 (2023-04-21) · sentiment · strength 2
▶ 29:32
REVERSAL
“So for this one network to get a fine of like 800 million, it's like pretty incredible. I mean, they should be handing out a lot more of these in my view, not just to Fox. But yeah, look, I would like to see, to that end, I would like to see the standard in New York Times versus Sullivan revised by the Supreme Court.”
Sacks
politics-market 48% · n=87
· E118 (2023-03-03) · explicit_prediction · strength 2
▶ 1:17:13
SUPPORT
“But I don't think they're going to be because that's not the legal standard. I believe that if a television network knowingly spreads and endorses baseless accusations against somebody, which they know or should know is basically untrue, I think they should absolutely be liable for libel or defamation. But that is not what the law requires.”
Who built this conviction
each voice's total push on the score, in conviction points across every mention — supports and opposes · share = % of all mention-driven movement
⏳ decay drained -7.6 over the idea's life — that's time passing, attributed to no one
Score events
| episode | kind | Δ | after | note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| E118 2023-03-03 | init | +35.0 | 35.0 | E118 born by Sacks (explicit_prediction x2) |
| E119 2023-03-11 | decay | -1.4 | 33.6 | E119 silent |
| E120 2023-03-17 | decay | -1.3 | 32.3 | E120 silent |
| E121 2023-03-24 | decay | -1.3 | 31.0 | E121 silent |
| E122 2023-03-31 | decay | -1.2 | 29.7 | E122 silent |
| E123 2023-04-07 | decay | -1.2 | 28.5 | E123 silent |
| E124 2023-04-14 | decay | -1.1 | 27.4 | E124 silent |
| E125 2023-04-21 | reversal | -16.4 | 11.0 | E125 Sacks flips |
| E125 2023-04-21 | oppose | -11.0 | 0.0 | E125 Chamath opposes x3 |
| E126 2023-04-28 | decay | · | 0.0 | E126 silent |
| E128 2023-05-12 | decay | · | 0.0 | E128 silent |
| E129 2023-05-19 | decay | · | 0.0 | E129 silent |
| E130 2023-05-26 | decay | · | 0.0 | E130 silent |
| E131 2023-06-02 | decay | · | 0.0 | E131 silent |
| E132 2023-06-10 | decay | · | 0.0 | E132 silent |
| E133 2023-06-16 | decay | · | 0.0 | E133 silent |
| E134 2023-06-24 | decay | · | 0.0 | E134 silent |
| E135 2023-07-01 | decay | · | 0.0 | E135 silent |
| E136 2023-07-09 | decay | · | 0.0 | E136 silent |
| E137 2023-07-14 | decay | · | 0.0 | E137 silent |
| E139 2023-07-27 | decay | · | 0.0 | E139 silent |
| E140 2023-08-04 | decay | · | 0.0 | E140 silent |
| E141 2023-08-11 | decay | · | 0.0 | E141 silent |
| E142 2023-08-18 | decay | · | 0.0 | E142 silent |
| E143 2023-08-25 | decay | · | 0.0 | E143 silent |
| E144 2023-09-01 | decay | · | 0.0 | E144 silent |
| E146 2023-09-22 | decay | · | 0.0 | E146 silent |
| E147 2023-09-29 | decay | · | 0.0 | E147 silent |
| E148 2023-10-07 | decay | · | 0.0 | E148 silent |
| E149 2023-10-13 | decay | · | 0.0 | E149 silent |
| E150 2023-10-20 | decay | · | 0.0 | E150 silent |
| E151 2023-10-27 | decay | · | 0.0 | E151 silent |
| E152 2023-11-03 | decay | · | 0.0 | E152 silent |
| E156 2023-12-08 | decay | · | 0.0 | E156 silent |
| E157 2023-12-16 | decay | · | 0.0 | E157 silent |
| E158 2023-12-23 | decay | · | 0.0 | E158 silent |
| E159 2023-12-29 | decay | · | 0.0 | E159 silent |
| E160 2024-01-06 | decay | · | 0.0 | E160 silent |
| E161 2024-01-13 | decay | · | 0.0 | E161 silent |
| E162 2024-01-19 | decay | · | 0.0 | E162 silent |
| E163 2024-01-26 | decay | · | 0.0 | E163 silent |
| E164 2024-02-02 | decay | · | 0.0 | E164 silent |
| E165 2024-02-09 | decay | · | 0.0 | E165 silent |
| E166 2024-02-16 | decay | · | 0.0 | E166 silent |
| E167 2024-02-23 | decay | · | 0.0 | E167 silent |
| E168 2024-03-01 | decay | · | 0.0 | E168 silent |