<nettime> Mark Ames: 10 Things Every Fearless Adversarial Investigative Reporter Should Know about Pierre Omidyar

[nettime's_embedded_reporter <nettime@kein.org>]

<http://pando.com/2015/02/28/meet-pierre-omidyar-a-handy-primer-for-new-first-look-hires/>

10 Things Every Fearless Adversarial Investigative Reporter Should Know About Pierre Omidyar

     By Mark Ames

     On February 28, 2015

1. Pierre Omidyar, his wife, and his top Omidyar Network director have logged in [39]over a
dozen visits to the Obama White House to visit senior officials and members of Obama's
National Security Council.

       39. http://pando.com/2014/03/23/revealed-visitor-logs-show-full-extent-of-pierre-and-pamela-omidyars-cozy-white-house-ties/

2. Between 2011-2013, Omidyar Network [40]co-funded with USAID [41]regime-change groups in
Ukraine that [42]organized the 2014 Maidan revolution. In India, the head of Omidyar
Network's operation, [43]Jayant Sinha, [44]concurrently worked for the far-right [45]BJP
Party leader Narendra Modi helping him take power in 2014, after which Modi appointed the
[46]Omidyar Network partner as his [47]junior finance minister.

       40. http://pando.com/2014/02/28/pierre-omidyar-co-funded-ukraine-revolution-groups-with-us-government-documents-show/
       41. https://www.evernote.com/l/AAGUkd3ft75Ha7xIz35eY9rmazxi_HOQ4s0
       42. http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/I4Q00914I40EO32B1483G0QP46A420A2:67652409/index.html?utm_source=tb_permalink&utm_medium=permalink&utm_campaign=tb_buttons&_sti=1149916
       43. https://web.archive.org/web/20131029223456/http://www.omidyar.com/team/jayant-sinha
       44. http://pando.com/2014/05/26/revealed-the-head-of-omidyar-networks-in-india-had-a-secret-second-job-helping-elect-narendra-modi/
       45. http://www.vccircle.com/news/general/2014/05/16/former-omidyar-network-head-jayant-sinha-gets-elected-hazaribagh
       46. https://twitter.com/OmidyarNetwork/status/467352544814305280
       47. http://pando.com/2014/11/09/pierre-omidyars-man-in-india-is-named-to-modis-cabinet/

3. Pierre Omidyar is a free-market libertarian loon who told Nobel Prize winner Mohammed
Younus he refused to donate to the poor unless he could [48]personally profit off of it. A
few years later, hundreds of poor rural Indians [49]committed suicide to avoid debt
collectors working for one of Omidyar's for-profit [50]microfinance lenders.

       48. http://pando.com/2014/05/31/ebay-shrugged-pierre-omidyar-believes-there-should-be-no-philanthropy-without-profit/
       49. http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/Feb/24/ap-impact-lenders-own-probe-links-it-to-suicides/
       50. http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/IKQA0105HK4E922A10C5K3RSC4C02427:76579211/index.html?utm_source=tb_permalink&utm_medium=permalink&utm_campaign=tb_buttons&_sti=1356693

4. Omidyar is the chairman of eBay/PayPal, which boasts of its own private [51]global police
force that works "hand in glove with law enforcement agencies," including the DEA, to whom
eBay provides user data "on a silver platter" without subpoenas.  Omidyar's eBay executives
boast of arranging [52]thousands of arrests around the world.

       51. http://pando.com/2013/12/14/team-omidar-world-police-ebay-puts-user-data-on-a-silver-platter-for-law-enforcement/
       52. http://www.csoonline.com/article/2135261/malware-cybercrime/ebay-security-offensive-leads-to-3k-arrests-globally.html

5. Although Omidyar allegedly does not interfere in his journalists' editorial, he does
control all hiring and firing, budgets, approval of expenses for taxi rides and cocktails,
snuffed months worth of investigative stories from leading investigative journalists, forces
editorial staff to attend countless meetings, imposes task-management software on editorial,
and [53]"writes more internal messaging than anyone else." But he does not interfere in
editorial.

       53. http://pando.com/2014/03/01/on-the-importance-of-keeping-investors-out-of-the-newsroom-and-not-treating-your-readers-like-fools/

6. Omidyar [54]believes that journalists should help police arrest sources who leak stolen
information from private for-profit companies. Omidyar supported the [55]persecution of the
[56]PayPal 14 because he believes that free speech rights should be [57]subordinate to the
rights of private enterprise's mission to maximize profits for shareholders.

       54. http://pando.com/2013/12/07/pierre-omidyar-in-2009-anybody-who-publishes-stolen-info-should-help-catch-the-thief/
       55. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/12/05/inside-the-paypal-14-trial.html
       56. http://thepaypal14.com/
       57. http://www.civilbeat.com/2010/12/7276-internet-press-vulnerable-after-wikileaks/

7. Omidyar is a [58]committed prepper whose fear of pandemics and epidemics is so great, he
has invested large sums into ensuring his own personal food supply, and has [59]buried
several months' worth of food in storage facilities in properties around the world, from
Hawaii to Montana, Nevada, and an island off the coast of France.  Omidyar keeps a private
[60]French jet, and pays a [61]private security detail made up of former Secret Service and
State Department officials to help him survive his apocalyptic fantasies.

       58. http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2009/Mar/22/ln/hawaii903220357.html
       59. http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2009/Mar/22/ln/hawaii903220357.html
       60. http://www.amjetexecutive.com/en/news/the-company/news-single-amlife/article/a-new-aoc-obtained.html
       61. http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2009/Mar/22/ln/hawaii903220357.html

8. In 2007, Omidyar [62]invested in Maui Land & Pineapple, which was subsequently accused of
being part of the [63]largest human trafficking operation ever [64]busted by US federal
officials.

       62. http://www.verite.org/node/470
       63. http://www.motherjones.com/print/53406
       64. http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/4-20-11b.cfm

9. Omidyar [65]loved Second Life so much he invested in Linden Lab and communicated with its
CEO through his Second Life character, [66]"Kitto Mandala," a tattooed black man who rode a
Segway and wore a T-shirt that read "KISS ME I'M LAWFUL EVIL."

       65. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/10/pierre-omidyar-first-look-media.html
       66. http://gawker.com/billionaire-pierre-omidyar-s-online-alter-ego-a-tattoo-1654041698

10. Omidyar was [67]investigated by [68]Congress and [69]sued for secretly "spinning stocks"
-- insider trading on IPOs -- with Goldman Sachs. Omidyar was also accused by Craigslist and
a Delaware judge of [70]stealing the "secret sauce of Craigslist's success" and passing
those secrets to eBay in violation of contracts, fiduciary duties and securities laws.

       67. http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/M4QI0105H6KCP22A10S5G39O44C0I427:76565565/index.html?utm_source=tb_permalink&utm_medium=permalink&utm_campaign=tb_buttons&_sti=1356687
       68. http://www.scrible.com/contentview/page/M4QI0105H6KCP22A10S5G39O44C0I427:76565565/index.html?utm_source=tb_permalink&utm_medium=permalink&utm_campaign=tb_buttons&_sti=1356687
       69. http://articles.latimes.com/print/2005/apr/29/business/fi-rup29.3
       70. http://pando.com/2014/12/01/whitman-omidyar-craigslist-ebay/

Bonus: Pierre Omidyar [71]arranged an interview with two "fiercely independent" journalists
on Omidyar's payroll at The Intercept, in which he revealed to them what tea he drinks in
the morning. When asked to list his daily reading habits, The Intercept came in at number
five, lower down on his reading list than the New York Times.

       71. http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/02/ken-silverstein-the-intercept-115586.html#.VPFB71PF-cY


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