Amazon, Apple and Google Cut Off Parler

This also raises another question. Facebook has much more problematic content in an absolute sense than Parler does, even if they have better moderation. After all, they have a far larger userbase. Parler may have a higher amount of problematic content as a percentage of all its content, but Facebook still has a large total impact. So why is their app still available?

The article that is linked here in the NY Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/technology/apple-google-p...) states examples of Parler deleting content encouraging violence. So it's not as if Parler is doing zero moderation. But it is clear that Facebook and Twitter are not perfect (or even consistent) in their moderation. So where's the threshold for when the unmoderated posts cause you to get deplatformed? That line seems arbitrary to me. It also seems like an unfair line since Parler has only 30 employees. If the response to censorship is "go build your own social network", then surely there needs to be allowance for small social networks that face a sudden influx of new users and traffic. Most users of Parler, and most content, is not problematic.

The same question should be asked when it comes to Twitter banning Trump's account. Twitter's own blog post (https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2020/suspensio...) does not make a great case for proving Trump was inciting violence - certainly none of the quoted info (like Trump choosing to skip the inauguration) would pass the bar necessary for a court to prove incitement. But a more basic issue here is that the vast majority of those who turned up in DC to support Trump and see him speak did not participate in the riot. Per various sources (example https://www.localdvm.com/news/washington-dc/three-demonstrat...) there were tens of thousands of attendees to the recent DC marches, across several fully-legal fully-permitted events. Out of all that, a few hundred raided the capitol. So if a small percentage of your followers engage in criminal activity, is that cause for a ban? And if that is the case, why wouldn't the same apply to other politicians or activists or social media figures? Why do BLM-affiliated events get a pass, with the criminal elements written off as a small fringe?

It’s not censorship when people are planning to overthrow the government and planning mass-murder.

Sure, sharing weird QAnon memes and Trump worship... I don’t care. That’s the equivalent of Fox News. But using it as a base of communication to overtly threaten to kill members of government (even ones I didn’t vote for) is crossing the line. From the article, there were hundreds if not thousands of users posting plans to regroup and bring guns and bombs to the Capitol with definite coordination between them all. It’s no longer a free-speech issue.

Anyone is free to set up a computer in their basement, install a web server, open up port 80 to the world, and serve to the world whatever blog or forum they want. This is the beauty of the web. They can scale it up as traffic grows and deal with all those headaches if they want. I fully support the owners of Parler if they want to do this.

Twitter, FB, AWS, Google eventually came along and said “ok, you want to share your ideas or host a community, we can make that really easy with our tools and platforms!” You can post what you want without worrying about servers in your basement. But in exchange for that convenience you have to accept that they reserve the right to terminate the contract at any time. They should not be required to help you promote ideas that they deem harmful or toxic.

So Parler can go back to how we used to do things in the 90s...it’s a little harder but not that hard. No one is being censored. This is simply a few companies deciding to terminate a relationship with one of their clients.

If you are so afraid of some ephemeral threat, tell us, did you support mail in voting and ignoring state election laws? Because if you are not worried about that, then you really don't give a shit about this country.

> This is why telecommunications companies sign decades long leases at colo facilities.

Agree, but the messaging so far is well into "you violated our acceptable use policy which would nullify our lease if we had one" territory. Even telecom leases have carve-outs for "abuse", which is always defined in sufficiently vague terms.