Parler is suing Amazon after the technology company launched the far-right social network on its web hosting services, claiming it is targeted for political reasons and to reduce competition.
Amazon Web Services started Parler from its cloud services just after midnight, Pacific time, on Monday, the site being inaccessible online starting at 4:30, Eastern time. Amazon said it understood Parler because it was not confident in its ability to monitor content on its platform, promoting or inciting violence.
“Amazon’s decision to effectively close Parler’s account is apparently motivated by political animus. It is also apparently designed to reduce competition in the microblogging services market for the benefit of Twitter, ”Parler said in a lawsuit filed Monday in federal court in Seattle. This violates federal antitrust law, the company claims.
Parler also accused Amazon of using a double standard compared to other platforms, noting that Twitter recently signed a multi-year web hosting agreement with Amazon.
Parler is requesting a temporary restriction order blocking Amazon from closing its Parler account.
“Doing so is the equivalent of pulling the plug on a hospital patient with the help of life. It will kill Parler’s business – just as it begins to grow,” the suit company said.
“There is no merit in these statements. AWS provides technology and services to customers across the political spectrum, and we respect Parler’s right to determine for himself what content he will allow. However, it is clear that there is significant content on Parler that encourages and incites violence against others and that Parler cannot or does not want to promptly identify and remove such content, which is a violation of our terms of service. We have made our concerns known to Parler over several weeks and during this time we have seen a significant increase in this type of dangerous content, not a decrease, which has led to the suspension of our services on Sunday evening, “a spokesman said. of Amazon in a statement emailed to CBS MoneyWatch.
Jakub Porzycki / NurPhoto by Getty Images
The Conservative platform’s popularity rose after the November election and was seen as a likely vehicle for President Donald Trump to reach his followers after being launched from most major media platforms after Wednesday’s siege of the US Capitol. In addition to moving, Google and Apple removed Parler from their app stores.
Talking’s CEO had said which could hit him offline for a week, although this might prove optimistic. And even if he finds a more friendly web hosting service without a smartphone app, it’s hard to imagine that Parler is gaining major success.
The 2-year-old magnet for the far right supports more than 12 million users, although mobile app analytics firm Sensor Tower puts the number at 10 million worldwide, with 8 million in the US. had on Twitter.
However, Parler could be attractive to Mr. Trump, as his sons Eric and Don Jr. are already active there.
Taken out of the Google app store
Parler was hit by winds on Friday as Google snatched its smartphone app from its app store because it allowed posts aimed at “inciting continued violence in the United States.” facilitates other illegal and dangerous activities. “Public safety issues will need to be addressed before they can be restored,” Apple said.
Amazon took another hit on Saturday, informing Parler that it will have to look for a new web hosting service, actually at midnight on Sunday. He reminded Parler in a letter, first reported by Buzzfeed, that he had informed her in recent weeks of 98 examples of posts “that clearly encourage and incite violence” and that the platform “presents a risk very real for public safety ”.
Parler CEO John Matze condemned the punishments as a “coordinated attack by technology giants to kill competition in the market. We were too successful too quickly,” he said in a post Saturday night, adding that it is Parler may not be available for a week “as we rebuild from scratch.”
“Every provider, from text messaging to email providers to our lawyers, gave up on the same day,” Matze told Fox Sunday Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. He said, while the company is trying to get back online as soon as possible, “it has a lot of problems, because every vendor we talk to says it won’t work with us, because if Apple doesn’t approve and Google doesn’t approve, will not. “
Loss of access to Google and Apple’s app stores – whose operating systems power hundreds of millions of smartphones – severely limits Parler’s coverage, although it continued to be accessible via the web browser. The loss of Amazon web services means that Parler must strive to find another web host in addition to re-engineering.
Meanwhile, another widely used far-right site, Gab.com, appears to have benefited from Parler’s problems. Gab posted on Twitter early Monday that it “gained more users in the last 2 days than we did in the first two years of existence.”
The future of ideology-based platforms
While initially claiming their need to be speech-neutral, Twitter and Facebook gradually succumbed to public pressure, drawing the line especially when the so-called Plandemic video appeared at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, urging people not to wear masks. , noted civic media teacher Ethan Zuckerman. from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.
Zuckerman expects the dismantling of the Trump platform to stimulate major online changes. Among them, a possible accelerated split of the social media world along ideological lines.
“Trump will attract a lot of audiences wherever he goes,” he said. This could mean more platforms with a smaller, more ideologically isolated audience.
Mr. Trump can also launch his own platform. But that won’t happen overnight, and free speech experts anticipate increasing pressure on all social media platforms to reduce incendiary rhetoric as Americans take stock of Wednesday’s violent takeover of the US Capitol by a Trump-instigated mafia.