A brief history of Gawker’s awkward relationship with Gawker guest Julian Assange

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange visited Gawker (or at least, its Web site) on Mondayto answer reader questions about his new book, When Google Met WikiLeaks.

. And while a lot has changed for Gawkers masthead and for Assange himself since he first rose to prominence, it would be remiss not to note Gawkersawkward history with Assange.

At least one Gawker commenter agreed with us:

The link leads here, to a post about Assanges television show.

Especially in the earlier days, there wasa tension for many sites in covering Assange and by extension, WikiLeaks and it was very much visible in the way Gawker chose to approach the subject.

On the one hand, WikiLeaks became famous because it facilitatedthe publication of several important, consequential stories about the security state by providing leaked classified documents to journalists.

On the other hand, WikiLeaks, the organization, has more and more existed as a support structure for the career of the man who founded it a man who is currently holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, avoiding extradition to Sweden on sexual assault charges.

WikiLeaks and its supporters have argued that such criticism is a distraction from its mission.

In the past, Gawker (specifically, former Gawker writer Adrian Chen) has gone hard on the criticism against Assange for those reasons. But that tone has softened a little as his immediate newsworthiness waned.

Below is a recap:

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A brief history of Gawker’s awkward relationship with Gawker guest Julian Assange