> but I can't understand any world where it's just that a person makes a potentially genuine mistake in their opinion/judgement, explicitly corrects that mistake multiple times and then only multiple years after correcting that mistake is sued.

Had Jones wanted to make the argument that he made a genuine mistake rather than knowing libel, he could have participated in discovery and trial rather than stonewalling and getting a default judgement.

Had he wanted to argue that he had made an after the fact retraction which reduced the damages suffered by the victims of his libel, he had the opportunity to make that argument, AFAIK, in the compensatory damages phase.

> Intent matters and after watching the trial I have very little understanding how the jury came to that verdict other than they just wanted to punish a bad person any way they could.

There is a reason punitive damages are called punitive: they aren't to compensate for harm, they are to punish, and thereby deter repeats of the action by the same or other parties.