I suspect Denton expected to have negative ramifications. I do not believe he expected to be held personally liable for the actions of a corporation he was part of and that both the personal and corporate liabilities would have unprecedented magnitude. Further, the article says that benefactor style lawsuits are fairly novel and thus it is unreasonable to expect someone with a vendetta for publishing a true statement about them would relentlessly pursue and finance litigation until the company was destroyed.
> it only effects[sic] the weak and diseased
I would hope, but would not expect that to be the case. The government and large scale corporations can certainly make headway sueing companies like wikileaks for publishing damaging media they do not control. This is quite a dangerous precedent and how bad things can potentially get is up to the creativity of very powerful companies & lawyers.