Background and career
Nik Lamas-Richie (born Hooman Abedi Karamian; February 12, 1979) is an American Internet personality most prominent in the late 2000s and 2010s. Richie is best known as the founder of controversial gossip website TheDirty.com.
Richie was born in Hackensack, New Jersey as Hooman Abedi Karamian to Armenian parents from Iran. Prior to his Internet career, he worked as a credit card processor.
Richie founded the gossip website TheDirty.com in March 2007 as DirtyScottsdale.com while living in Scottsdale, Arizona and started using the pseudonym Nik Richie, as he preferred to stay anonymous. The content on Dirtyscottsdale.com initially focused on derision of Scottsdale's club scene. Ben Quayle wrote for DirtyScottsdale.com
Co-founded by Ari Golden, the later and more widely known version, TheDirty.com, allows users to anonymously upload their own "dirt" including news, gossip, accusations, photos, videos, or text, and comment on posts submitted by others. Richie operated TheDirty.com anonymously until September 4, 2008, when he was arrested for DUI and reckless driving in Scottsdale. Once news of his arrest surfaced, Richie publicly admitted his real identity. In a March 2019 Instagram post, Richie stated he was no longer associated with TheDirty.com, having 'retired' from the site in April 2018.
"A lawyer for Dirty World LLC, David Gingras, says he represents Dirty World LLC, which operates Thedirty.com. ... He says the company named, Dirty World Entertainment Recordings, does not own or have a relationship with the website." In May 2010, Richie's website TheDirty published web posts:
"to retaliate against Kristen Creighton of La Porte, Texas, who won a $1.5 million judgment in October against Richie and his company, Dirty World." In 2011, Memphis, Tennessee, TV reporter Lauren Lee's lawsuit demanded that posts be permanently removed and $50 million. In a heavily publicized case, Sarah Jones v. Dirty World Entertainment Recordings, LLC, a federal court in Kentucky initially found that Richie was not entitled to CDA immunity in a case arising from several posts about Kentucky high school teacher and part-time cheerleader Sarah Jones. The jury awarded Jones $338,000 in compensatory and punitive damages. However, Richie filed a successful appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which in June 2014 ordered the judgment vacated and dismissed. Richie has been the defendant in several lawsuits relating to material posted on TheDirty.com. Richie has argued that he is protected from liability by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, like other operators of blogs and websites that allow third party users to submit content.
