Content Warning: This matter does contain discussions of suicide, particularly suicide in relation to bullying and difficult relationships with peers. If that’s a topic that is very personal to you, while this does discuss defamation law, it’s unlikely that anything in this is going to be worth reading this for. Please take care of you and use your discretion.
YouTuber Karl Jobst has made many and numerous videos about the lawsuit brought against him by Billy Mitchell – many of them full of bravado and mocking Billy’s claims regarding the lawsuit. So, when Karl lost the case on 1 April 2025, it went worse than the usual bad news on April Fool’s Day.1 Mitchell v Jobst [2025] QDC 41 District Court Judge KC Barlow went into detail all the aspects he found relevant in this 118 page judgement.
Karl attempted to resume his regular content, he took the video down because he concluded that he needed to address the issue.2 Karl Jobst (First week of April 2025, YouTube) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3ltptWa0xfrDweghW94Acg/community?lb=Ugkx2SvAB2ecQ1pF_U3gXh8maSs7XbXdmxhy Karl’s fans were not happy and felt very confused and mislead about the situation, particualrly those who contributed to his GoFundMe.3 Karl Jobst Karl Jobst Legal Defence Fund (4 November 2022, GoFundMe) https://www.gofundme.com/f/karl-jobst-legal-defence-fund
On 18 April 2025, Karl released his video explaining his side of the story – I and many other people were very unimpressed.4 Karl Jobst I Lost (18 April 2025, YouTube) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1XBqeAQ3nI I, in particular, was unimpressed since despite Karl apparently having spent a fortune on lawyers and been discussing this for years – he didn’t seem to understand basic concepts of law. He also seemed to downplay his own involvement in people believing this was a lawsuit about cheating at video games, and not about an allegation of using spurious lawsuits to bully someone to a point where they committed suicide.
My name is Kim, I’m not a lawyer but a law student in New Zealand who was born and raised in Queensland, Australia. Most importantly I’m not your lawyer and I’m not speaking for anyone but myself here. Please don’t interpret blog posts as personal legal advice, ever.
I’d like to talk about defamation, how it works when it escalates to an Australian court, what went wrong for Karl and how it fits into this overall situation. I will however, be adding extra information where I think it’s relevant to understanding the parties and the events.
Though I’d like to be clear, I’m going to try to avoid speculating about conversations or the relationship between Karl and his counsel – as while I understand that its terribly fun to do from a gossip perspetive, it’s not productive for genuine understanding and all of it is tied up in strict confidence. Also, we can see what they were working with:5 geniusdude69 Fuck the lawyers I paid for with YOUR money (4 April 2025, Reddit) https://www.reddit.com/r/youtubedrama/comments/1jqs49z/fuck_the_lawyers_i_paid_for_with_your_money/
- 1Mitchell v Jobst [2025] QDC 41
- 2Karl Jobst (First week of April 2025, YouTube) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3ltptWa0xfrDweghW94Acg/community?lb=Ugkx2SvAB2ecQ1pF_U3gXh8maSs7XbXdmxhy
- 3Karl Jobst Karl Jobst Legal Defence Fund (4 November 2022, GoFundMe) https://www.gofundme.com/f/karl-jobst-legal-defence-fund
- 4Karl Jobst I Lost (18 April 2025, YouTube) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1XBqeAQ3nI
- 5geniusdude69 Fuck the lawyers I paid for with YOUR money (4 April 2025, Reddit) https://www.reddit.com/r/youtubedrama/comments/1jqs49z/fuck_the_lawyers_i_paid_for_with_your_money/