According to Fox Business Parler CEO John Matze has been removed by the small group of owners of Parler. Rebekah Mercer (financial aspects) and Dan Bongino (public face) are pushing back against the reasoning that Matze is sharing with the public.
At the 30,000 ft level the outline of the problems are clear. Both elements within the ownership group have issues.
It was not surprising to see the trouble they encountered with re-platforming the social media network.
First, here’s the report:
EXCLUSIVE – Parler has terminated CEO John Matze, according to a memo Matze sent to staffers that has been obtained by Fox News.
“On January 29, 2021, the Parler board controlled by Rebekah Mercer decided to immediately terminate my position as CEO of Parler. I did not participate in this decision,” Matze wrote. “I understand that those who now control the company have made some communications to employees and other third parties that have unfortunately created confusion and prompted me to make this public statement.”
Matze wrote that over the past few months he has been met with “constant resistance” to his original vision for the social media platform following Amazon Web Services’ decision to shut Parler down for failure to moderate “egregious content” related to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
“Over the past few months, I’ve met constant resistance to my product vision, my strong belief in free speech and my view of how the Parler site should be managed. For example, I advocated for more product stability and what I believe is a more effective approach to content moderation,” Matze wrote.
Parler did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“I have worked endless hours and fought constant battles to get the Parler site running but at this point, the future of Parler is no longer in my hands,” he continued. “I want to thank the Parler employees, the people on Parler and Parler supporters for their tireless work and devotion to the company. They are an amazing group of diverse, hardworking and talented individuals and I have the utmost respect for them. Many of them have become my second family.” (read more)
First, Matze should have been fired -and the ownership group eviscerated- for allowing the vulnerability of their host server system to exist on Amazon. That was perhaps the stupidest decision of a “conservative” platform ever.
Second, it seems apparent from Matze statements he wanted a heavily moderated and highly controlled moderation system in the platform. Inevitably that can be problematic because humans have to make the decisions on where the line is… it is not easy to support free speech while knowing that some speech can lead to your removal for extremist content. Moderation is a key component, but a balance is needed… the location of the balance bubble seemed to be the issue.
Third, Dan Bongino takes exception to the way Matze frames his support for free speech.
Parler Owner @dbongino corrects the false narrative leaked out by the fired CEO of Parler, John Matze.
My take? Bongino is a winner. Parler will be back up and better than ever before you know it under better leadership. pic.twitter.com/Xrw84qDvvX
— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) February 4, 2021
Bottom line is…. from my perspective… the front end of Parler was not the priority. If it was, the decision to make Amazon the server host would never have been made. Instead it was the backside operation, the user data, that held the value from the Mercer perspective.
That outlook makes the most sense.
As they did with Breitbart, the Mercers were in the business of assembling the identities of users that could be leveraged as a commodity for engaged political influence. This is what the Mercers did with the 18 month Breitbart poll of 2016 GOP republican candidates. They built a file of site users for their candidate, Ted Cruz, to use.
It looks to me like the emphasis on Parler 2020 was the same as the emphasis in the Breitbart purchase in 2014. User data providing contact information of conservative minded Americans was the priority; that’s why the ridiculously obvious front-end vulnerability was permitted… it simply was less important than the backside value of the data.
One thing CTH is 100% committed to is to never compromise user privacy for any data exploit; even if that means forgoing bells and whistles that people want. User privacy is the #1 priority…. When you start there, you are forced, by your mission statement, to focus on front-end security and stability. Every decision related to user privacy is what makes a website anti-fragile because it eliminates the intrusion of Big Tech.
Parler joined with Big Tech and launched with Big Tech… and they suffered the consequences of not having emphasis on the front-end of their creation where stewardship on behalf of the user is the #1 priority. To me, that’s the bottom line.
Protect the front-end users from exploitation by locking down the privacy issues and everything else will fall into place. Allow the front-end users to be exploited, and/or assemble data on those users that might be exploited by others; and/or allow vendors who are not under the same privacy rules; and the site stability will always be vulnerable.
I noticed something wasn’t right when @CodeMonkey on Twitter revealed how vulnerable Parler was and how users were being asked to give out personal information. It all started when someone set up a fake Parler account pretending to be @CodeMonkey and this fake account was actually verified on Parler as @CodeMonkey. Well obviously the real @CodeMonkey fought back and then exposed all the lax security. He questioned why Parler would need someone’s SSN to become verified. Dan basically shrugged him off on Twitter but I’m thinking he took it far more serious behind the scenes.
Half accurate. Ron’s license doesn’t say “Codemonkey” or “NeonRevolt,”two of his twitter handles. To be “verified,” the user had to present a front/back copy of their driver’s licence, which is probably the same process on Twitter. They all want us to answer personal questions, which is why you can choose to give fictional into. He took exception with the lack of security for user data.
If your driver’s license shows your “socialist” sec number you need to get that fixed pronto! I changed mine years and years ago to a different number – I don’t think any of the states can insist your license has the soc.
Not supposed to since the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004.
Exposing your SSN number leaves you vulnerable to ID theft, so it’s not supposed to be on your driver’s license.
Guess you didn’t read the fine print. Not only did they make you give tons of data and a secure phone up front, they also made you legally agree to do endless data collection on your computer WITHOUT specifying what.
So years from now as technology continues to evolve you’ll be getting more and more invasive data collection on YOUR devices.
(You checked a box that connected to a contract allowing them to do that like so many unethical sites do… never check a box without reading because even credit card companies will never stop yanking funds from your account if you checked a box you didn’t read letting someone do that).
And given the Mercers scr3wed up Breitbart in the past, Bongino wouldn’t tell Sundance if they were selling that data like they did from Breitbart, and are now involved in this debacle you are risking a lot to be on that site.
SO … we know of a few people whose liberal bosses fired them for being on Parler in spite of total middle of the road normalcy AND that Twitter mobs were doxxing everyone on Parler including law enforcement and military AFTER the “whoopsie” hacking they allowed to happen.
I don’t understand why you’d go back there, but to anyone else I hope you’ll keep your family safe from whatever the Mercers and these other data mining crooks are up to.
And I wish we’d all support some comprehensive and binding legislative protection against this stuff since more and more thieves are doing it.
Are you saying … if I comment on Breitbart … the Mercers can identify me?
I hope Sundance can answer.
All I saw was that it might be data they collected from the polls they do if I was following what he was saying.
Great question.
I’m sure we’d all better find out what data mining Breitbart is doing and what the heck is up with all the bans, days of disappearing comments, shadow bans and the stories they hide on the site itself like vote stealing.
I hope someone knows the answer to that and the other weird stuff going on at Breitbart.
Um, I wasn’t asked to present my driver’s license, either on Parler nor on Twitter. All they wanted was a camera pic of my face to verify.
Parler was clunky and never improved its clunkiness. That told me they weren’t user-focused.
As usual, Sundance zeroes in on the real purpose of the account
Let me give you some inside baseball on this “lack of features” observation you are expressing. While I fully agree with your observations — that it wasn’t ever feature rich enough to complete with Twitter. Ask yourself why that would be. I suspect you already answered yourself with the presumption that they were never serious about Parler in the first place.
Here’s the LEGAL reasons: Software and services are “patentable” and as such, they are inhibited from implementation by others without a license. I have followed countless legal battles over software and service patents where some were stupid and were struck down by courts and others were supported. But the bottom line is lawyers, licensing, negotiations, settlements and law suits are a huge part of that landscape.
When Twitter was buying up its competition, it was buying more than just the competition. It was buying any and all patents associated with those businesses. Those are then used as weapons to suppress and limit the potential for others to compete.
Dirty ugly business.
I’m a holder of a software patent for “computer-aided electronic quotation processes,” yet dozens of companies built platforms and services around RFx that were clearly computer-aided electronic quotation processes.
I doubt that Twitter could sue successfully any competitor that provided a platform that mimicked Twitter’s basic functionality: users who post thoughts and links, other users who can choose to subscribe to or “follow” those users, user statistics, trending and analytical tools, likes and dislikes, etc. These things are so basic to a communication platform as to be unpatentable. True, Twitter could tie them up in court, but Twitter would eventually lose.
Why do you “doubt Twitter could sue successfully any competitor”, has something in any recent court ruling history given you that idea? I would say it is entirely possible Twitter could and would successfully sue, and what was the recent court ruling on Amazon reneging on Parler’s contract? That should give you some idea.
They don’t have to successfully sue.
Once you’re in court, you’re hemorrhaging money.
That does presume a court would never be biased or corrupted in any way. That *NEVER* (sarcasm intended) happens in this country.
So put your servers in Sweden the way the encrypted emailers do. Once that country is corrupted, move elsewhere.
They cannot make every function illegal. And someone in the crowd will have a cheap idea that can be implemented to make a site user friendly.
So much can’t-do-ism has infected Conservative sites. There is a solution for most problems. It’s an infinite world.
Gab has overcome worse problems than Parler, perhaps because they had better intent going in.
I agree. Subscribe, unsubscribe, follow, link, likes, dislikes and trends are all unpatentable.
Is it really that hard to make something fun? It’s about community. Just some commenting, respond features, privacy and a moderator to beat down trolls (which by the way, some sites have trusted users volunteer to do on shifts so there’s no cost and you can all enjoy ridding yourself of a pest together).
The truth is users don’t need a lot. It’s information and connection, and a site like Parler theoretically should have the users doing all the work which is the content creation. IF that’s what the site was about.
I do not buy you can’t have a suggestion box and find cheap ways to do things users would like. Usually a user has a suggestion for cheap implementation too so you can crowd source solutions.
They were some kind of data mining front job like Sundance outed.
They made you agree to total invasion of your computer which not even Twitter does.
As I’ve said many times, currently Don Jr. is doing something similar unfortunately so I’m really, really hoping Big Daddy Trump learns from the Sundance model not his child who I otherwise like very much. I still like him and think the Trump family have been unfairly hit financially for the crime of helping citizens.
I’m going to begin moving to data protectors only. You can see where this Big Brother election stealing is heading.
They want to control and sell you, power corrupts and right now they are being quite evil and invasive about their use of your data.
Y’all spend a lot of time thinking that how things OUGHT TO BE is how they is.
Patent law is a purposefully screwed-up system, designed to favor the party with the deepest pockets. Research ‘zombie patents’ or ‘patent squatters’ for a dose of how this stifles innovation.
Incidentally, this is what section 230 revocation (and ALL forms of content regulation) will do for online free speech.
You spend all your time looking for why things can’t be done and call that reality. It isn’t. No matter what your belief system that is self limiting and really, really stupid at a time when we need to be idea storming solutions.
It’s very skewed and damaging to yourself to think that way. Fair enough. Crap up your own life. But at least don’t be the wet blanket trying to short out everyone else’s circuits. We have a country to save, productive people only to step forward and help, please.
They might not win. They sure could sue competitors and force them to spend a small fortune to defend themselves.
Thank you for the info. I do not keep up with this.
It can also tell us that two guys from the Comp Sci program at the University of Denver just weren’t very good at their jobs.
JOIN Gab **********GAB VERSUS PARLOR **** GAB IS THE WINNER
Why Gab is the market leading alternative to Big Tech and will continue to be.
https://conservativehardliner.com/why-parler-sucks-and-why-gab-superior
.
Parlor bans users it disagrees with and routinely ban users for even silly posts it disagrees with – NOT free speech friendly)
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200627/23551144803/as-predicted-parler-is-banning-users-it-doesnt-like.shtml
What is ‘extremist content’, is it the BS about ‘bombs’ around the Capital that comes out of AOC’s mouth. https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/02/03/aoc-those-challenging-riot-story-manipulating-people-who-dont-know-the-layout-of-capitol-complex/
i think calling everyhign racist is creating an incentive for violence on those people (righteous violence is more dangerous because they think they are killing Nazis).
I think calling everything White Supremacist is creating a realm of misinformation and an enviroment for violence, mistrust, and confusion.
both of those are very extremist compared to someone saying something like Obama wasnt born in America potentially. a person could say who cares , later…
Does anyone have a transcript of Bongino’s vid? I prefer reading things, which is one of the reasons I tend to hit blogs over stuff like youtube.
Thank you!!!! Vids are a horrible waste of time! I can read or skim text way faster than do a vid.
Interesting. I prefer reading for stuff where I need to quickly see information or if it’s relevant.
Now on Youtube commentors routinely summarize videos or put time stamps on them to help the masses. I always scroll comments first before my long time investment on the video. If comments are turned off I know there’s a reason and pass.
When actually listening and trying to absorb something I want video.
So I don’t like podcasts which are like the worst of both worlds. I wasn’t born in the 1920’s as some kind of radio listener and even though I’m not really overly visual I don’t just want to hear content. You don’t have to be a supermodel. But I need the visual cues of your expressions and stuff when I’m listening to something.
I will take your podcast being filmed any day. So none of you have to look fancy, I just want to see what’s happening with the audio. In fact I almost love how untelegenic my favorite video creators are because I know that before the gate keepers controlled everything all that personality would not find an audience.
But yeah, if I want to learn something quickly give me text, let me skim and cut to the chase. Then go back if I need to.
I like it when you get the article with video so I can pick.
https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/parler-ceo-john-matze-has-been-fired/
Matze made it clear that he was NOT a necessarily a Republican or even conservative in an interview I remember seeing as Parler was beginning to add new subscribers during the kerfuffle with Twitter. And according to Dan Bongino, he wanted to acquiesce to the demands of Google and Apple to get it back. The other owners and Board apparently have other plans and I wish them well. In other words, Matze is just another RINO like so many others.
so …dan put a democrat in charge?
It looks like Matze was there long before Dan B invested, so, no.
He actually founded the company not Danny.
Matze may have been a “Decepticon.”
Dan is more valuable them most others. he is a public face willing to fight in public for us. that has its perks.
Like Ben Domenech owner of The Federalist who cut his reader comment section in its entirely after being braced by Google over ad revenue, he caved like a good RINO and got a job at FNC as a establishment opiner!
That was followed by the HF on their site The Daily Signal, also completely stopping their reader comment section.
I stopped visiting The Federalist. I don’t want to give up American Thinker, but I probably will if they don’t allow discussion again.
Puke. Our side is always getting bought off. Such low moral bribe-ables.
We really are going to need our own parallel universe information-wise and funding and all that.
One thing that’s indisputable is that Matze said Parler would only be down for a week after the AWS termination. He claimed that the Parler code had been written to be independent of specific AWS functions.
But on Jan 17th, Matze revised the timeframe to the end of the month, and called Parler’s new website, which apparently contains ONE static page and no actual functionality, “a big milestone.” (To make it worse, he’s got the Bernie meme photo plastered on it. Bluuchhhhh.)
I don’t know Matze’s resume. But a good case could be made that his accompolishments at Parler were underwhelming at best.
Parler had a terrible clunky platform. I really miss being on twitter but I am not supporting that communist Jack.
Me too.
It’s hard to resist trolling the BBC on Twitter, but the trouble is that ANY sort of contribution to Twitter helps them. As Oscar Wilde said: There’s no such thing as bad publicity.
Why do we keep having to hear about Matze. We just want Parler up and running and NOT cave to big tech. To continue to put Matze in the news daily, it’s very questionable as to WHY. Is it to cause ill will towards Parler? Come on conservative websites, don’t be attacking your own!!!!
time to bruise each others egos and get a real debate that moves us all forward.
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Parlers platform is not WAR -WORTHY in the battle of letting people be anonymous. They must protect the users. Once that is achieved they can be looked at again.
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The key point of these CTH articles appear to be stressing user data is WANTED and its being exploited – removing our anonymous nature and leaving us vulnerable to doxxing and firing (for saying something like President Trump is a good man).
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They want to know the anonymous thinkers. Why are we anonymous – because in public they would destroy our thoughts so WE RAN TO BEING ANONYMOUS. if our data isnt protected then there is no reason for us to be on that website.
Yeah, pretty clear some people aren’t reading what Sundance is telling us.
And honestly, they got hacked once. People’s liberal bosses fired them just for being garden variety Conservatives using Parler. Twitter mobs doxxed police and miltary members. WHY are they making their users vulnerable?
And what WORSE are THEY doing to you with all your data?
We have to be shopping around and finding alternatives now, and since we’re always attacked and our sites get bribed off Drudge style we have to stay mobile and ready to move on when a place gets outed.
Parler is outed. Please protect your data for your children and grandchildren’s sake if not your own.
I vouch for nothing, but I’ve heard others are finding sites more protective of data.
We can’t just focus on free speech anymore. ALSO important is privacy.
Big Brother shuts you up AND makes you live in a Panopticon. Don’t let them North Korea you.
How sad that someone as honest and honorable as Rep Devin Nunes was caught up in such an operation as this.
And how dishonorable are those who had different priorities than Rep Nunes to use Rep Nunes goodwill for unwarranted free PR.
And how sad no one bothered to determine the origin of that initial Bongino speech given at David Horowitz’s that made Bongino “famous.”
Can you provide the link to that? I’d like to see that speech.
Me, too. Without proper citation that just sounds like drive-by smear.
Receipts, please.
You want a link, not a receipt.
Listening to too much Bannon is not good for one’s health.
I disagree – “receipts” is a catchy term that helps frame the argument for the public.
Bannon has a good sense of the theatrical, like PDJT. It’s badly needed by our side, like every other iron we could possibly have in the fire.
As for what is not good for my health, I’ll take plenty of whatever I want to listen to, watch, or read, whenever I want, over constant attempts to denigrate whoever is publicly in the fight, any day of the week.
Then again I’ve never held a weapon in the circular firing squad; it’s not my thing.
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/11/23/dan-bongino-presentation-of-spygate/
Some of us have actually been here for a while and have memories.
Most of what we reference is found right here in the pages of CTH.
The search function is at the top of every page, right hand side.
Every post since CTH’s beginning is also available. I’ve read a great many. Have you?
Nunes pushed a great idea, that ended up exposing the Amazon Web Serivces issue publically.
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I think Dan got screwed because he invested. He right now is wondering WTH is going on im sure, because i doubt he secretly wants to sell our data to Biden.
No guarantees this is the right one but it’s from 2018 at the David Horowitz Center…
Given the length of time the site has been offline, I have to wonder if principals at Parler have decided the lawsuit and potential damages are more important than having the platform operational? Amazon allegedly had a contract with Parler they violated and Amazon has deep pockets. So, who knows?
BB has turned into an electronic troll orgasm and it is loaded up with so much garbage it is nearly unusable.
I agree with your assessment of Breitbart. If you’re interested in the moronic yapping of Reiner, Amy Schumer, Kathy Griffin, Colbert, Streisand, or a whole host of other Hollywood idiots, then Breitbart is for you. I could not possibly care any less for these leftists’ “opinion de jour” therefore I don’t do Breitbart anymore. Most of them would not have a forum for espousing their lunacy were it not for Breitbart.
I know there was a “spat” between Bongino and Sundance on Twitter or something (I’m not on any social media).
But I just hate to hear people bagging on Bongino, Rush, and others on here…I’ve listened to their podcasts while working on projects. They’re on our side…they might not always be right…but they are on our side.
I make mistakes, too.
Fair enough, and I follow an old quote popularized by Ronald Reagan when dealing with the Communists, something those of us who remember air raid sirens and diving under school desks can identify with.
That was a good one.
Wasn’t Reagan also the originator of the term “big tent”?
Governor Ronald Reagan, April 1, 1967
https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/april-1-1967-address-governor-ronald-reagan-california-republican-assembly
TBH, I was too interested in chasing girls back then to pay much attention to state politics and an actor who was governor. Only reason I paid a little was because dad worked for the state of CA and was a FDR Democrat and war vet. Bobby, MLK and Watergate changed all that. I see plenty of parallels in current events harkening back to that period of the 60’s and 70’s, main difference is the laptop I’m typing this on filled a whole room at dad’s office back then and ‘internet’ was a direct data line to Sacramento and social media was the water cooler.
People do make mistakes, but when they are epic those responsible have to wear it.
I liked Dan, but Sundance is spot-on where it was written…
“First, Matze should have been fired -and the ownership group eviscerated- for allowing the vulnerability of their host server system to exist on Amazon. That was perhaps the stupidest decision of a “conservative” platform ever.”
I absolutely agree that the ownership should have stepped in when the decision to host on AWS was made. That was a bone-headed move. Perhaps a symptom of absentee ownership.
I’m mainly just pointing out the conservative tendency to engage in the circular firing squad. I’m way more concerned about the country sliding into socialism without a shot being fired than I am with Bongino not being a perfect conservative.
It’s also worth noting that there is a MASSIVE chunk of our voter base that is just plain uninformed. Some of the things we here know to be true sound so absurd to these people that they just tune it out. It’s people like Rush and Bongino that ease people’s eyes open slowly so that they can start to see what is happening. It’s only when people start to realize that they are being lied to by almost every news source available that the put forth the effort required to seek the truth.
We NEED all the help we can get to open people’s eyes to the truth. It’s just hard to understand all the eyes that are still closed if you’ve had yours open for any length of time.
The world then was people honor contracts..
the world we are describing in this article is all our war. literally an enemy pursuiing you at every step. —
that image of the world and the wall, and us.. almost implies we have to rebuild our own infrastructure to survive this.
Yeah .. honestly I think we do too. And we don’t have a lot of time.
It’s not long before you’re shut down North Korea – China – Iran style if you as a country don’t step up.
jobs that pay no matter what..
if the fed can shut farms down, and person to person sales — then i think its time to talk about ending something
Or, as Ace has pointed out (ace.mu.nu), what if these people thought the old rules of cOrPoRaTiOnS ArE OuR FrIeNdS still applied? Would any of us envisioned a breach of contract for ideological reasons? If AWS had not shut them down they would have scaled up rapidly with the Twitter exodus. That decision does smell short term; I give Sundance credit for the line of thought. But I think the story, as always, is more complicated.
As Dan Bongino says, don’t worship any golden calves. Probably will limit your disappointment when people fail you or themselves.
….so if anyone is “on our side” we are never allowed to say, “Whoa! What did you just say/do?”
That’s silly.
That’s like saying I am never supposed to question anything someone in my family says or does. And when I do question something someone in my family has said or done, I am certainly not doing it from a perspective that I never make mistakes. That kind of all or nothing perspective doesn’t make any sense either.
Part of the attractiveness of the Treehouse used to be an emphasis on carrying on a conversation….not just reacting and choosing up sides. The idea was to talk about ideas.
Sharon:
I don’t know if you read my post above in reply to ColtLending or not, but it was posted prior to your comment here. I clearly state that Bongino made a stupid move letting his social media company be hosted on AWS.
I don’t think it’s at all silly to question or discuss things.
But as you state, we should be conversing and “not just reacting and choosing up sides”. There are comments in this thread that are “choosing sides” and writing Dan off. That is what I was reacting to.
Agree…while I enjoy reading CTH, I don’t like bashing other conservatives nor do I worship every little thing Sundance writes. We need to look to the future and stop constantly bashing other conservatives for every mistake or misspeak.
We are trying to survive in a commi fascist ecosystem. The “speech” is free for Satanists not for Christians.
But, Thank you for giving us TCH.
LOL. That sums it up.
There’s the reason people give for why they do something and then there’s the real reason.
Hope Robby Starbuck is right! We need a platform to rival twitter.
I have a Dream the CTH will do it.
I know it’s usually best to stick with what made you success, but right minded people really need a platform that can compete with Twitter.
he just makes user profiles on this.. webdashboard at login that hold messages and retweet (user interface dashboard, and public interface dashboard for that user (similar to the twitter we see per profile). and add those features it.
its not a huge issue – and i doubt CTH wants to do it.
I give up. Who is Robby Starbuck?
What I see are people setting up pundits or gurus who are ostensibly “Conservative” and stickiing with them no matter what. We should question everything, everyone. I still remember when Glenn Beck was the be all, end all. That came to a screeching halt. Beck helped it along.
I see a need for self-confirmation when people pick up these pundits and hang on their every word.
I still haven’t figured out what the big deal is about Bongino. Former NYPD officer (for a while), former Secret Service (for a while). Fox TV personality. Full stop. Now he is a god to some. Why?
Parler’s user interface was nowhere near as good as Gab. And they kept promoting RINOs. It was fairly obvious it was Breitbart social media.
The problem with Gab was nobody was on it.
I don’t really like Gab’s much either – I am very picky about user interfaces.
That said, I’m glad I finally got on there, and I really enjoy the fact that there is a Treehouse Friends group there.
Vox Day called out Parler as a user data piracy scam a long time ago. Platforms have to make money, but protecting user privacy is prerequisite to success, so a choice needs to be made. Parler made the wrong choice early on. Hard to fix now.
Yep, the bills always arrive and business is business. However, in this day and age, there are many ways to pay the bills if one has an attractive platform and message, outlets like RSBN have shown one way, they grew from nothing when I first ran across them in 2015 to Trump central today where nearly a million people were watching their stream of the Jan 6 rally. Even Mike Lindell donated a portion of his revenue to their work and may continue to do so, IDK.
Then there are boards like CTH and locals and other similar boards, some free content, options to donate, subscription options, premium content options, etc, etc. Watch out for the MBA types who are focused on money, they’re little different than the corporate enemies we deal with daily. Big tech showed those types the gold they could mine and plenty of humans are simple greedy creatures even when they wear suits, look nice and talk smoothly and convincingly. It’s up to us to discern the difference.
I don’t use social media of any sort, well I did use ICQ in the 90’s. Saw the writing on the wall regarding ‘free’ and got the heck out. I did buy some books and Russian language tapes from an upstart online portal called ‘Amazon’ and no doubt Bezos has a decent profile on me but such data can be honeypotted too, used to deceive and manipulate and lure enemies into a trap. We need to get smart about things if we’re going to prevail against and organized, Borg-like, well-funded enemy. Corporate America is a big part of that enemy. It is what it is.
Sounds like a site I need to read. Are they always this helpful and accurate?
Don’t care if one likes or agrees with the ex-CEO.
Search on Chairman of the Board Rebykah Mercer. Articles on Mercer Foundation – Koch Brothers – Ted Cruz appear. Enough said.
Like everything else in politics, it all came down to one unqualified bad CEO, who would of thunk that, here in American with all our genius CEO in business here. Well I’m closing my Parler account and praying for go-fund-me’s help starting an electric automobile company to compete with GM.
Make sure you hire illegal aliens. Don’t want the Department of Injustice coming after you.
Clearly Matze and anyone else in management who implemented the fundamentally flawed service should have been fired before this. We have a small portfolio of companies in SaaS and medical technologies, all with cloud-based services. I had one of our CTOs (PhD in applied math from Oxford U) reach out to Matze when this became public. Matze didn’t even begin to comprehend what our guy was telling him to do with respect to the cloud service. This shows a real weakness on the part of the investors.
If there were a Parler, as depicted, folks would flock to it.
Why aren’t there more?
Why only Fox News for soooo long?
A good business model gets duplicated all the time!
Food for thought for those watching.
Yeah. FOX was controlled opposition all along. It drove me nuts.
Conservatives actually care about different things that race hustler gender bending Commies.
Yet FOX only talked about the AP agenda of the day, showed endless clips of liberal media, then tried to put some talking point answer to it.
Everytime we gave the debates to them they tanked US. They helped the enemy!
I knew they were hopelessly corrupt and would never change after the MeAgain Kelly debate debacle.
UniParty
We need real opposition. I used to want Breitbart to create other platforms including cable, now I’d love Trump to do that unless he too gets bought off, duped or whatever.
Trump tries to create action and solutions, not just endless yakking complaints.
I’d like that. Show me the problem and tell us how to pool our efforts to fix it. And give us the power of input if we feel an adjustment to the strategy would work better for us.
PDJT’s very life is in danger. The time for him to be “bought off” was in 2016, and he declined. That’s why they are trying to destroy him.
People here seem to lack an understanding of these Marxists and what they actually do. Look at the history of the USSR. History repeats, and it’s doing so here. Today we have gulags, real and virtual. You can wind up in the federal prison system like Manafort. Or, if they can’t find something serious enough to convict you of, they will accuse you of thought crime and big tech and the media will destroy your life and bankrupt you.
We are living in one giant gulag, and the left are the guards.
Gab is far better than Parler ever was. Gab is fine. Torba has worked on it and as he said he only has 5 employees working to keep things up and running. It’s fine. Parler’s interface was terrible. Gab also has GabTV and Gab Groups. The groups are great because it’s smaller numbers of people in specific interest areas.
Gab firs launched in 2016 and yes there were and still are some nutters on there. So what. There aren’t on Twitter? It’s just that with a smaller group of people sometimes they are more noticeable. So mute or block them that’s what I do. I like CTH but I also like Gab and use both.
The fact that many of the establishment blue checks don’t go to Gab is also fine with me. I’d rather talk to everyday people and have a conversation. I’ve never been a follower of influencers and people who try and tell me what to think. The heck with them. I’ll think for myself thanks.
Sounds fun. Thanks for the scoop.
Why did all those blue checks go to a data mining operation like Parler instead of Gab?
It’s impressive he’s fought off all these attacks with a staff of 5. I remember when they shut him down the night before the election. He got back up quickly.
If Parler were legit they should have known what was coming from the attacks on Gab and had Gab’s solutions ready in advance.
And was Bongino hired to be a celebrity influencer? It seems like his role was to invite other celebs and the public there to flee from Twitter.
The Mercers don’t seem to want to be a public face.
I just realized one thing.
The fact Trump has not picked a new social media home means something.
What, I do not know, but everyone has tried to lure him including Parler and Gab.
Is he building his own site like the rumor said? Is he checking out security?
All I know is EVEN if Trump goes somewhere I’m only following depending on the privacy issues, but I’m definitely interested to see his next moves.
Even his uncharacteristic quiet is the most exciting thing out there. I literally will not watch Bribed-en hose and sell America but am hopeful Trump has an interesting move next. I’m prepared either way, it may be good it may be bad. What a missed opportunity if it’s not good.
My guess since Parler went down was that it was a honey pot designed by those who wanted a way to silence alternative communication when it became necessary.
They created a site attractive to disaffected big-tech users, and it gave big tech the ability to pull the plug on just about every contrary voice in the entire country.
So, using cloud services by big tech was no accident. It was the plan.
Yeah, that sounds about right. Interesting read. We all knew as we scramble to realign and re-emerge traps would be everywhere PLUS attempts to buy out and/or attack anywhere we go.
I am so sick of these tyrannical a holes.
Matze appears to be a “decepticon” in Sundance vernacular. Parler got the funeral Parlor. Hopefully Dan can help raise it from the dead.
As of this date, my real identity is unknown across all social media platforms (including comments sections) because when I logged-on to the Intranet in 2001 with my 1st hook-up from the cable company, every single time I ventured into that wonderful place, I knew my skirt was up over my head, and my panties were down around my ankles, and I for sure didn’t want to be held responsible for that naked nightmare! (ha ha)
We have indeed been blessed to have this place where we can all express among ourselves events taking place around. Most importantly a place where we freely openly declare the many ways God is working His salvation on the earth. We must agree that it is God’s salvation not man’s. It is men who are being saved haha we aren’t saving anyone or anything incapable we are. And for that reason God raised up a man for his own self through whom he could bring this salvation, none other than the Man Christ Jesus. He is not 50% man and 50% divine as some purport. But rather He is 100% both God and man and He has been given charge over bringing many sons to glory.
To me, when I look at a picture of Matze, I see a very weak, and somewhat slimy, person. Just his face…weak.
ROTFL … I didn’t want to say anything. LOL. Too true. Darting, furtive rat eyes or something. I could not follow whatever that “CEO” is into any kind of choppy waters.
Opinion:
Twitter has been a hard act to follow. Along with CTH, Twitter was my morning news. Twitter posts were all pieces to a puzzle that helped me form the picture of what was going on in Portland/Seattle as well as some good details regarding election theft.
Parler was too globbed up with pictures but it did offer postings from people/groups silenced on Twitter. I won’t go back to Twit and don’t miss Parler.
I use Gab now and wish more people from Parler and especially Twit would migrate. Gab needs more news and onsite videos. (Good, yet a) thing about Gab, responsible self vetting of info is even more necessary than at Twit and Parler.
Parler was far better than Gab. I was on Gab from 2018 and never really enjoyed the experience. I joined Parler early on and was quite satisfied with the experience. I left Twitter and left GAB after being on PARLER, I have not rejoined Gab, but I am still not enamored by it. I am also on MEWE and find that much better than Gab. I am waiting for Parler to go back on line.
I have followed Conservative Treehouse for a while, but since the change over, I am discovering that I do not hear about any replies to my comments. Am I not doing something right with respect to seeing replies? I also was on American Thinker but left when they shut down the commenting section. To have an exchange of ideas, one needs to be able to comment and have interaction through replies.
Eileen, I’m still learning the ropes with commenting via the new procedures. I’m not even sure you will see this response. I copy my comment via the ‘Comment Link’. If you hover to the far upper right side adjacent to your name and date you’ll see the chain (near the flag). Select that to copy your comment. Save the link and then go back from time to time to see if anyone has responded.
Haha, if you have found my response, you likely already know how to do that so I wasn’t much help. You can also Subscribe to the section where you commented. It’s right above the comment window. I don’t use that anymore.
Need a “share” to gab button.
(If you like listening to an old guy be dreary and cynical, find me on gab.)
I haven’t had good luck finding anyone on Gab! Their search needs help.
Took me quite a while this morning to find Marjorie Taylor Greene – she’s on there, as verified, but under the name Marjorie Greene.
Is anyone familiar with the new directive allowing backdoor cooperation from big tech with the government to provide details on anonymous owner/posters of content?
I briefly heard it on the shapiro radio as i was changing channels?
not sure if this is the article…
it covers a reality Czar, sharing user info of people that discuss misinfo against the election and covid (debate speech will be shut down).
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/02/technology/biden-reality-crisis-misinformation.html
“Most of the experts agreed that the most effective thing the Biden administration could do to fix our national reality crisis, and possibly even de-radicalize some of those who have been lured ..”
“De-radicalize,” eh?
Is that a fancy “reimagining” of “re-ducation,” with its designated camps and all?
Basically, they will continue to use the NSA databases too. Look for a lot more IRS audits of conservatives too.
then maybe we need to stop being conservative …. and trump supporters.. and start being marching for mom…
use their tactics. mask us in love and caring and our fEET WALK FORWARD.
im not a conservative i care about mom, im not a live i care about mom, im not a white person i care about mom, im not a human i care about mom. im not _______ I care about mom.
Parler is backed by Rebekah Mercer and most likely her father, Robert.
Robert has a high-tech background, it does appear “unusual” Parler was so vulnerable to Amazon.
What interested me, was the picture Sundance attached to the bottom of his article.
I researched the Mercer Family along with their association to Trump. There are many negative and positive views of the Mercer/Trump relationship however the following URL was the most extensive. The author appears to be left leaning, his cartoons are above my pay grade.
Nevertheless this article written in 2017 gave me hope!
It’s very long yet very extensive, it shows how and why Trump is where he is along with the tech used to get him there.
It includes Bannon, Kelly Anne Conway, Cruz, Breitbart, Koch Brothers, Renaissance Technologies, IBM, Waddell, Mercer’s ideology, and Cambridge Analytica (mines for data)
https://baystreetex.com/index.php/2017/04/25/robert-mercer
Good article! I read half and bookmarked for the rest.
May I ask… What is the value of a tweet? once thats established. maybe another tool could do that..
I see no reason whatsoever to disbelieve Dan Bongino’s impromptu Press Conference stating the reason for the changes at the company that he is part owner of.
It sounds to me like the #1 goal of Parler was NEVER to help people connect and communicate, but rather to mine their contact information.
You know what that’s called? A SCAM!!!
It is always important to remember that the basic role of Conservative Inc. media is – in part* – to draw eyeballs that are ordinarily not glued to Official Government Party Media. Many of them are just filling a market void, and the conservative stuff is just a way to generate clicks. They don’t believe a word of it, and the people in charge would sell you into slavery for the right price. If you are not watching NFL games or cable news, The Government Party and corporate America needs to figure out how to get you focused on them and their products some other way. So, sites like Parler crop up spouting lots of things that make Conservatives tingle in all the right places. There’s a huge influx of new subscribers and users, but before long the whole charade is exposed either as a scam or it is coopted in some way.
Lookin’ at you, Newsmax.
*The other role Conservative Inc. media plays is to defend the Left from Normal America by defining what is in and out of bounds for “acceptable” Conservative thought. One of their favorite phrases is “that’s not who we are”. They’re also famous for presenting “the Conservative case for [insert Liberal freak show cause here].” Most of the big Conservative Inc. media outlets are donor-controlled, and the writers post whatever bizarre interpretation of conservatism they are paid to produce. It is a well-financed controlled-opposition.
Parler has been a hot mess since I first heard about it, and it never worked well for me. Twitter, to me, is like sticking a blue toothpick directly into my eyeball. I saw no purpose in using a red one instead.
“The Conservative case for an all-Transgender Military” soon at National Review
Well, apparently Biden has them on a witch hunt in the military for “white supremacists”…so you’re not wrong.
That’s a brilliant post. Are you quoting someone or is that your assessment? Really very incisive and likely accurate.
Thank you.
I want OUT of the UniParty matrix.
Lesson learned: we are all engaged in an escalating information war.
Once again…what’s the strategy? Or will it be emergent adaptive?
Million dollar question, isn’t it. Or after this budget battle and upcoming chaos the quadrillion dollar question.
The Yahoo comment section used to be wild back when Yahoo still allowed people to comment on their articles.
I apologize for generalizing but in my memories, the Yahoo comment section surprisingly leaned conservative.
Yep it was. Yoohah would publish a dumb leftist article typically devoid of truth and conservatives would come by and tear it to shreds. Conservatives were by far the majority in the Y! comment section. Fun days ?
I saw that too. Yahoo commenters were very Conservative. I’ve heard that all sites left alone have gone Conservative which is why the Left have devolved into fascism and tyranny.
It makes sense. You start out thinking you have feminist tendencies. Then you see a childless, man-hating, untalented, shrieking humorless harridan trying to control the world. Now others come along to poke fun at her.
Who do you side with? I found out I hate feminists by hearing them.
That happens on every issue.
The Left cannot win a fair fight and have zero morals and satanic tendencies so they go to cheating and villainy to forcefeed their hell on you.
that’s why the ridiculously obvious front-end vulnerability was permitted… it simply was less important than the backside value of the data.
Not sure it was “ridiculously obvious”, except in 20/20 hindsight. Five years ago, could anyone have predicted this? Yes, one could have thought in the back of one’s mind that it was a possibility, but no one really believed a total shutdown had a high probability. I believe the allure of have the capacity to obtain many more millions of users far outweighed any perceived risk of a shutdown.
question, and hope i dont get in trouble but ive read that codemonkey and his dad are Q anon. anyone know different.
Who is Codemonkey?
Q was peple looking for superman. if anyone is condemned for looking for someone to save us then the police should be disbanded…
—-
people avoid talking of that topic because its obvious it was going to be used to shut people down.
—
however a good response would be ” I was looking for superman since no one in congress will do anyhting! no good guys no supermans here in congresS? why wont you in congress be our hero?”
I think Q is psyops. I think they are working against us.
FYI, the latest hit on the Mercers from “Salon” with pull quote from Steve Schmidt https://www.salon.com/2021/02/04/how-one-billionaire-family-bankrolled-election-lies-white-nationalism–and-the-capitol-riot/
Schmidt: The Never Trumpers former anti-Palin, GOPe sabotage squad, now going to the premier leftist publications like Salon to spew against their billonaire enemies.
It looks like we are well passed the point that Andrew Breitbart spoke of in 2012:
Who gives a flying F about Parler. Why would you host it on AWS? Really. They hold like one of the largest CIA contracts.
Should have canned his a$$ right from the start for making a deal with AWS. Who cares how hard he worked. Stupid move and it cost Mercer and Bongino. A failure is a failure and this is a massive one.
**********GAB VERSUS PARLOR **** GAB IS THE WINNER
Why Gab is the market leading alternative to Big Tech and will continue to be.
https://conservativehardliner.com/why-parler-sucks-and-why-gab-superior
.
Parlor bans users it disagrees with and routinely ban users for even silly posts it disagrees with – NOT free speech friendly)
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200627/23551144803/as-predicted-parler-is-banning-users-it-doesnt-like.shtml
“Protect the front-end users from exploitation by locking down the privacy issues and everything else will fall into place. Allow the front-end users to be exploited, and/or assemble data on those users that might be exploited by others; and/or allow vendors who are not under the same privacy rules; and the site stability will always be vulnerable.”
Sundance nails it as usual. I didn’t hear either side discussing this key issue.
I would have loved to see Trump create a social media app to counter the Big Tech media. Talk about enraging democrats when they would hear, “I saw a video on the Trump app how you were caught in a lie.”
I was listening to Dan Bongino’s podcast today and he kept claiming they they were the “free speech” advocates as opposed to Matze but he never said what that actually meant. I get it that such things as promoting violence, criminal acts, or harming others is not ok and has to be policed but I am weary of what their version of free speech is. If users cannot openly communicate about white people and their interests, men’s issues, or discuss minorities / immigrants / gays / abortion / religion (including Jews and Muslims) / etc. in any sort of non-deferential way, it is not free speech. Gab already allows this which is why they can be called ‘free speech’. They are rough around the edges but already have a platform that is anti-fragile enough to withstand the assault so far. If Parler just ends up becoming another Twitter who cares about them? Tell Trump to use Gab.
The Real Unexplored Key – when & where dies POTUS Trump re-emerge?
When?
An easier guess. After the latest Impeachment fails.
Where?
A new Patriot communication service? Gab? Parlor?
Trump would immediately bring 20-50 Million users… how can any entity scale like that, unnoticed?
I’m cheering for Gab, but it appears their CEO is still green… when he read that Jared K allegedly argued against POTUS going to Parler & Gab, the CEO fired if multiple anti-Kuschner tweets. Grow up. Some of the concerns legit, you were struggling to handle 3 Million users?
Gab, and Conservatives, also need a way to handle CC processing / other during the cancel culture. Big hurdles, more opportunities.
Okay, so FWIW, I will list a couple of things that Dan said in his podcast this afternoon, because my mileage does vary.
He collects his paycheck from his sponsors on his daily show/podcast (which is fine), and also from Fox appearances (which I wish he would stop), and (I would guess) maybe other enterprises such as rumble.com.
But he stated today he invested a lot of money in Parler and never to date has made anything on it. If you think he is lying, fine, but there’s no evidence that he is.
And which “biz” that “makes him sick” are you talking about that gave him a pension? So far as he says, his “bizes” have included police officer, prosecutor, Secret Service agent, and failed candidate for Congress, until he started his current career as a commentator.
If he worked all those years at those jobs and collected enough of a pension to start other businesses, more power to him.
He also stated, which I also guessed, that as an investor he never had power to fire the CEO, but now that it’s done he is 100% in favor of it.
I suspect there is probably an element of he said/he said in this spat.
The Mercer angle is still an unknown to me, but I will be looking for more on it – thanks to a poster above who provided a sort of deep-dive link…
And I have one very large example of a use for social media. PDJT used it very successfully to become our greatest President ever. It certainly is a terrible tool used for evil, but can be used for good, like any other.
The truth is you have no idea if CTH will or will not share your information. The operator of the site is entirely private and there would be no accountability if information was ever shared.
Furthermore, I still have not seen the Patrick Byrne writings covered on this site.
Why?
Do yourself a favor and put his name in the search bar before you make false claims.
Thanks.
I can’t decipher this debate. I do mashups of Shakespeare and the news to overcome the stress the stolen election and the Stasi-like suppression of free speech is causing me, and here’s the one that’s relevant to Parler. (It’s got Marc Antony’s eulogy of Caesar cast as a eulogy over the death of freedom of speech): https://abardseyeview.com/if-you-have-tears-prepare-to-shed-them-now-marc-antony-and-the-deplatforming-of-parler/
I have to say, I don’t trust the motives of any of them, including Bongino. Once he criticized those of us considering a Patriot party, I was done with him.
once you see the strings….
I remember reading SD’s exchange with Bongino during the early deplatforming days and seeing that first little ray of sunlight….Bongino came back into the conversation hot, but was soon silenced with the truth, as the truth has no agenda.
I cannot say that I did not see this coming…
I can say that I am perplexed at the lengths these folks will go to to grasp at the cut strings of the aforementioned marionettes….
#Wolverines
The money they make sharing our willfully shared information. Just like Newsmax’s resurgence. Hmmm, I wonder why they came back so strong and seemed so legit…..