I think of “cancellation” as being tried and convicted in the court of public opinion; this is somewhat orthogonal to being tried and convicted in an actual court of law. An example of someone on the left being cancelled is Al Franken.

I don’t think Thiel really changed the public’s opinion of Gawker. They were always considered extremely low-brow tabloid media, and to their users I think that was sort of the appeal. They didn’t shut down due to a drop in popularity, they shut down because a lawsuit bankrupted them.

Right-wing cancelation happens, but it is usually reported as a campaign of harassment.

Instead of calling your advertisers to complain about perceived racism, think unsavory stuff like spam and GamerGate threats.

Right canceling grew out of troll and gamer culture. Left canceling SJW grew out of decades-old activism.

It is of similar type: ganging up on someone your group picked as the next victim, robbing them of their safety or speech without a formal and fair judgment.

But left-wing canceling (say, leaving 100 bad reviews on Yelp for a family business of someone going viral for a 10 second out of context clip on Twitter) is way more advanced and sophisticated. 4chan lost gamergate the moment the press focused on the death threats of a few incapable of expressing their autistic rage in an argument.

The left is more savvy. It knows that a single newspaper photo of 3 activists has similar value to a hundred uncovered protests. They know how to wield the taboo of racism as a weapon to avoid critique. They make you remember why their victim deserved it.

They got to make their case in open court and lost. That's like saying Derek Chauvin was "cancelled."