Google has suspended a social network that pitches itself as a free speech platform.
While social media platforms are trying to regulate users and what they say, parler is doing the opposite. Just recently former American President Donald Trump was banned from all social media platforms, his supporters and every page or user that was supporting his beliefs have been banned. However, social media is powerful, you can easily use it to cause another world war which is why it’s rather shocking how parler has been promoting unregulated free speech on their platform.
What is Parler?
Parler launched in 2018 and posed as a “free speech” platform that was an alternative Twitter and Facebook. The idea was to encourage users to share their opinions freely without any worry. Somehow the company has managed to survive up until now and it even seemed credible when Apple listed Parler as the No. 1 free app for it’s iPhones. However, since then it seems things haven’t been looking up as they probably planned out.
It wasn’t exactly the right time for Parler to be listed as the best place to express freely.
Trump and his supporters have been demonstration offline and online and since Twitter and Facebook have strict rules against hate speech or any information that encourages violence, it seems like it was the only logical thing to do but to go to Parler and continue there.
Apple said in their statement:
“We support diverse points of view on the App Store. However, there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity,”
Both Apple and Google felt as if Parler didn’t do enough to regulate their users so instead they were kicked out from their app stores. The main issue was the fact that too many users were promoting violence and crime and not much was done about that either.
By late Saturday, Amazon told Parler it would boot the company from its web-hosting service on Sunday night. All because of repeated violations of Amazon’s rules.
As of now, the media site is completely offline as a result of Amazon terminating Parler’s web hosting services. The official Parler website now returns a 403 error, while its app is showing networking errors.
There’s nothing like free speech.
The reality is that even when you express yourself it still has to in line with community guidelines or editorial guidelines. As much as everyone has a right to their own opinion, your opinion shouldn’t be any that can promote violence or any form of disrespect. Freedom of speech doesn’t exist as a fact, Parler’s true intent will not truly be understood but so far you can download the app on their website and with its AWS services now down, the website and apps no longer work.
Parler’s CEO John Matze claimed that Amazon, Google, and Apple “worked together to try and ensure they don’t have competition.” He also added that “They will NOT win! We are the worlds last hope for free speech and free information.”
He also added that despite the challenges they will be able to rebuild their app again from scratch in a weeks time which clearly shows that he’s ready for competition and doesn’t see anything wrong with how people express themselves.
This may not necessarily be the end but there is definitely a war coming. Free speech constitutes misunderstanding when you use your views to attack another party.
Facebook, Twitter and even the likes of TikTok are doing their best to fight the discrepancies of free speech but will it be enough?