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Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

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31–40 of 485 posts

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#31

Out of curiosity how much time for remediation is generally allowed before service is pulled? Surely the precedent is not "you do something bad and we ban you immediately "? In FTA it says AWS generally gives 30 days per their contract with Parler, but I mean in general, if there is a general precedent. Even if Parler wanted to do the right thing here, they were pretty much banned everywhere immediately.

There seem to be a few examples of gcp turning off service with little to no notice and no follow-up.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#32

Paragraph 5 seems pretty damaging if AWS really did violate their contract as claimed.

Don't think that flies. They quote a generic section on Termination for Convenience but completely leave out the relevant section on Suspension + Termination for Cause:

From section 6.1 on Suspension:

    We may suspend your or any End User’s right to access or use any portion or all of the Service Offerings immediately upon notice to you if we determine ... (a) your or an End User’s use of the Service Offerings (i) poses a security risk to the Service Offerings or any third party
Then they go on to complain about how AWS has completely terminated them, but that section also doesn't appear favorable.

From section 7.2 on Termination:

    We may also terminate this Agreement immediately upon notice to you (A) for cause if we have the right to suspend under Section 6
Parler has copious amounts of this violent content going back for months, so it seems like this is a sure case of a "willful and continuing failure" to apply the required moderation in the agreement. IMO this shows an ongoing breach of contract so the "for Cause" clauses would apply.

The Anti-Trust argument seems like the strongest here but that's pretty notoriously difficult to succeed with. I guess not too far from the App Store cases going on right now.

The AWS agreement is here: https://aws.amazon.com/agreement/

TLDR: Content promoting violence - clearly more than mere threats given the actions of several users on Jan. 6 - is against the AWS agreement and services can be terminated immediately upon notice.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#33

"Friday night one of the top trending tweets on Twitter was 'Hang Mike Pence.' But AWS has no plans nor has it made any threats to suspend Twitter’s account." Is this true?

According to NYT, many of the tweets were discussing the fact that demonstrators were shouting the phrase. The tweets themselves allegedly were not directly inciting violence.

> Mr. Matze pointed to the fact that Twitter had recently promoted the phrase “Hang Mike Pence” as a trending topic. (The majority of the discussion on Twitter was about rioters chanting the phrase about the vice president on Wednesday.) “I have seen no evidence Apple is going after them,” Mr. Matze said. “This would appear to be an unfair double standard as every other social media site has the same issues, arguably on a worse scale.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/technology/apple-google-p...

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#35

Paragraph 5 seems pretty damaging if AWS really did violate their contract as claimed.

I haven't looked at standard AWS contract language but they ban people all the time for TOS violations, and I will be pretty shocked if their contracts don't have an allowance for sudden cut-offs, because that's something they routinely need to be able to do.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#36

Twitter is also dependent on AWS, as of December. Are they vulnerable too? https://press.aboutamazon.com/news-releases/news-release-det...

If they aren't actively moderating offensive* content: absolutely.

I think he's going to have a REAL tough time convincing a court that Twitter doesn't moderate content given that his justification for starting Parler was Twitter being too aggressive in moderating...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/abrambrown/2020/06/27/parlers-f...

*Offensive probably is the wrong term - content that violates the AWS TOS like calls for violence.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#37

Twitter is also dependent on AWS, as of December. Are they vulnerable too? https://press.aboutamazon.com/news-releases/news-release-det...

If they refuse to moderate their content, as Amazon asked Parler, presumably yes. But Twitter does moderate it's content.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#38

I have seen so many violent threats and incitements on Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, and Instagram over the last 5 years that Parler could possibly make the case that they've been singled out, but I doubt it. They're just too unsympathetic of a plaintiff, imho. That said, antitrust battles against Big Tech will dominate the next four years of economic policy, and rightfully so. GAFA is too big, too powerful, too manip…

They already had plenty of enemies on the left. Now they got a ton more on the right. Elon Musk was just tweeting about the hatred headed their way. Time to check my investments.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#39

I have seen so many violent threats and incitements on Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, and Instagram over the last 5 years that Parler could possibly make the case that they've been singled out, but I doubt it. They're just too unsympathetic of a plaintiff, imho. That said, antitrust battles against Big Tech will dominate the next four years of economic policy, and rightfully so. GAFA is too big, too powerful, too manip…

It is weird to me that we people seem to be saying "These 4 companies need to be broken up". They are already 4 companies. It seems different than say, the Bell breakup, which was one company.

Re: Parler LLC vs. Amazon Web Services Inc

#40
And here we see the problem with centralized social media. Did anyone think that handing control over to megacorps would end differently?

Today it’s Parler, tomorrow it’s whatever political ideology Big Tech finds inconvenient.

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