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Conservatives are flocking to the social media app Parler
- riffic 6y agoActivityPub, the web standard that powers the software that currently holds the #1 spot on top of HN today, is better.
- horsemessiah 6y agoAh, good. More echo chambers.
- pizzazzaro 6y agoNo censorship. I'd be interested in seeing if that applies to Zoomer Maoists and their guillotine talk.
- bmarquez 6y agoI'm trying out Parler. While I absolutely hated having to add a phone number to sign up, a positive side effect is that I have not run into any obvious troll or bot accounts. So far, it's keeping everyone honest. This will probably also turn out much better than Gab due to the presence of high-profile politicians.
- jki275 6y agogoogle voice phone numbers work.
- axaxs 6y agoI hope so, too. I'm not really interested in 'social' these days, but joined Gab early on out of curiosity to check it out. That didn't last long. While not everyone was bad, there existed enough racist and hateful content shown to me to make me feel sick.
- test1235 6y agoThat was a bit like voat, which tried to champion itself as a reddit alternative
- Kye 6y agoTwitter will hit you with a suspension and a demand for a phone number shortly after signing up. It hasn't helped with the troll or bot problem.
- datavirtue 6y agoReddit recently started banning for not supplying a verified email. Lost a 12 yr old account. Meh. Fired up another account and then never went back.
- smitty1e 6y agoI've seen a troll account on Parler. The account name referenced a prominent conservative pundit's anatomy in a diminutive way. We'll see how long Parler remains "unbiased".
- asdf123wtf 6y agoThe first link a friend shared with me to Parler was to a post by what looked like a qanon troll bot. Or who knows, maybe it was just a genuine believer. Either way, its unlikely that this network will elevate any conversations.
- chrisco255 6y agoI like seeing the competition. Maybe that's the answer for the social media bias. But I fear that any private platform will eventually get corrupted. I would strongly prefer an open-source standard to beat out the big tech monopolies.
- riffic 6y agothat standard exists.
- smhmd 6y agoWhat are you referring to? I find IRC irritating, personally.
- riffic 6y agohttps://www.w3.org/TR/social-web-protocols/ https://www.w3.org/TR/social-web-protocols/
- chrisco255 6y agoWhat's the user friendly, normie friendly open source social media service that rivals Twitter and Facebook in usability?
- riffic 6y agoGo to the front page of HN, and view the top post today. That is just one example of software that uses open web standards published by the W3C. There is a healthy ecosystem of software being designed to conform with these specifications.
- asdf123wtf 6y agoMastadon? Its nearly there anyway.
- azangru 6y agoCNBC title: "Trump fans..." HN title: "Conservatives..." Are conservatives regarded as indistinguishable from Trump fans these days?
- Acrobatic_Road 6y agoThe HN title is more accurate and less click baity.
- jacquesm 6y agoI don't know about that. This is fairly obviously an attempt at doing an end-run around Trump's tweets being labelled fake or doctored (if they are) and to have a Trump friendly medium to reach the voters ahead of the elections so they get to control the message. Trump's brand of politics has relatively little to do with the conservatives as we've come to know them through the ages, it's more of a takeover of a political party by an outsider than anything else. Many people who call themselves conservatives are loath to be associated with Trump and his cabal. Though of course they likely don't mind ramming through some supreme court justices that will vote along their preferences.
- jfengel 6y agoHe got 60 million votes in the last election, and nearly all will do so again. They may loathe him but they loathe him less than any liberal opponent. He sees that as support and acts accordingly. It may not be "conservatism" in some outdated sense of the term, but people who use that label vote for him in droves. Linking the two is not unfair.
- SamReidHughes 6y agoNot at all. Trump's actual governing has been conservative. Not that there haven't been some awful bits, but it extends beyond judges to cabinet appointees, military posture (no new wars), stances on open borders, and miscellaneous stuff, like federal hiring based on skills, not degrees. He's governed more conservatively than the last two Republican presidents.
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- tibbydudeza 6y agoWell that is great ... give nutjobs like Alex Jones their own echo chamber to rant and rave about Bill Gates, Soros 5G , Corona and the evil of vaccines.
- loraa 6y agoIt's dangerous to let conservatives have freedom of opinion and freedom of speech. Time to gather up the liberals and shut it down.
- Traster 6y agoIt'll be very interesting to see if a social media network exclusively of political content will be viable. Twitter may have a lot of politics on it, but that's not its raison d'etre. I have to laugh at the article though: >“With Devin Nunes came a whole pack of haters,” said Matze. He said that parody accounts are fine and even welcome, but Parler draws a line when it comes to spammers. “You can’t spam people’s comment sections with unrelated content,” he said. Well, firstly, it's well documented that Devin Nunes has sued parody accounts, and seccondly, making editorial decisions about which comments are suitably related is the editorial control that right wing partisans are falsly claiming is a red line abot twitter. Given that we know Parler is offering a bounty for users, how much did they pay CNBC for the puff piece?
- sethbannon 6y agoIn describing the site as a bastion of free speech, the Parler CEO says “If you can say it on the street of New York, you can say it on Parler.” But, according to the article, "the app doesn’t allow terrorist organizations or support for terrorism, the sharing of false rumors, violent language (what the site describes as 'fighting words') toward others, blackmail or pornography." Last I was in NYC, "fighting words" were most certainly allowed, as was pornography, as was the sharing of false rumors (most of the time). Seems like he's just drawing a different arbitrary line and trying to claim he's a purist for free speech.
- Traster 6y agoThat's because none of what he said was true, it was signalling.
- gotoeleven 6y agoThose are cases where the supreme court has found restrictions on speech to be justifiable, in case you thought it was just a grab bag of random stuff.
- scarface74 6y agoWell, seeing that Supreme Court decisions on what is legal to censor has absolutely no bearing on what a private corporation can do. The right to free speech only applies to what the government can and can’t do.
- alkibiades 6y agoactually the supreme court has ruled that fighting words, pornography etc, are all perimissable to be banned within the scope of the 1st ammendment. it’s very specific legal terminology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_words https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_words
- geofft 6y agoRe fighting words, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaplinsky_v._New_Hampshire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaplinsky_v._New_Hampshire : > The complaint against Chaplinsky stated that he shouted: "You are a God-damned racketeer" and "a damned Fascist". Chaplinsky admitted that he said the words charged in the complaint, with the exception of the name of the deity. It wouldn't surprise me if public sentiment in the US in 1940 was that such terms were not constitutionally protected, but First Amendment jurisprudence has changed a lot since then - see e.g. https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/ https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-ha... and https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-time-to-stop-using-the-fire-in-a-crowded-theater-quote/264449/ https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-tim... for some background. Is this site actually taking the position that calling someone "a damned Fascist" is a) not constitutionally protected, as we understand the constitution today b) worth banning? Re pornography, it is very much legal and constitutionally protected in the US. Obscenity (which "appeals to the prurient interest ... depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct ... and ... lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value") isn't constitutionally protected, but this site bans pornography, obscenity, and non-obscene indecency.
- froogle 6y agoYou have to be careful: given a rallying cry of free speech and no censorship, the main appeal of the platform is going to be attracting those holding unpopular opinions. This happened with the mass exodus from Reddit to Voat of r/the_donald and similar, and I absolutely can see it happening here. Voat became host to a ton of toxic communities. And because of that, it's going to push more orthodox people people away from the site towards Twitter in a self-reinforcing loop. The plan for the site to get a broad range of opinions (in this case, the bounty of $20k for a prominent liberal) seems doomed as a result. Still - hopefully the founders have learned from Voat and have plans in action to stop it before it gets too stuck in the cycle. The bounty is an interesting idea, though I don't think it'll be strong enough to break the perverse social dynamics involved. More competition with Twitter is a good thing.
- tenebrisalietum 6y agoThe terms of service PDF is really clear on what and what is not allowed. Particularly interesting were links to the US Entity list of defined terriorist organizations. Downloadable in a text file (and it's large). Since it's not pseudo-anonymous like Voat, and is also being endorsed pretty much by politicians, I think it won't fall into the same traps. I think it's going to become a de facto pipeline to politicians though. The Terms of Service sound like the vision of a social media network after a Section 230 crackdown.
- GEBBL 6y agoYou know someone’s a wanker if you see Parler on their phone. Could be useful in this way.
- Crye 6y agoIt's not clear it's a bastion for free speech. According to this tweet, folks are getting banned for imitating politicians. https://twitter.com/RespectableLaw/status/1276590556374880258?s=19 https://twitter.com/RespectableLaw/status/127659055637488025...
- briefcomment 6y agoI think free speech should be qualified as speech that you wouldn't get called out on in a setting with super open minded people who always give you the benefit of the doubt. Impersonating others seems like it's probably always done in bad faith.
- Grue3 6y ago>folks are getting banned for imitating politicians Why is this bad? Freedom to impersonate other people is an issue orthogonal to free speech.
- tkiley 6y agoI'm surprised that a "Free Speech" network would demand that its users indemnify it against liability arising from their speech. Here's Parler's ToS: > You agree to defend and indemnify Parler [...] from and against any and all claims, actions, damages, obligations losses, liabilities, costs or debt, and expenses (including but not limited to all attorneys fees) arising from or relating to your access to and use of the Services. Parler will have the right to conduct its own defense, at your expense, in any action or proceeding covered by this indemnity. Twitter has no similar clause, because 47 USC § 230 provides computer services with a pretty good shield against liability of this kind. I'm not sure why Parler would include such a clause.
- derision 6y agoThat shield might be weakening https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.natlawreview.com/article/president-signs-executive-order-directing-agencies-to-probe-contours-cda-immunity%3famp https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.natlawreview.com/article/pr...
- troughway 6y agoSo if this is the platform for the conservatives - what's the platform for the liberals?
- DaniloDias 6y agoWhy are people still trying to build businesses on the idea that people need a new way to talk to each other? It feels like these solutions cater to the lazy or the distract-able. All of these businesses start looking so shiny and inevitably are masticated, then digested, and then reach the final state associated with excretion. Free services just fuck their users.
- causality0 6y ago“If you can say it on the street of New York, you can say it on Parler.” Even if his claim were true, he's going to hit the same problem Twitter did: profitability. Twitter doesn't censor because its CEO is some kind of bleeding-heart softie, it censors because advertisers won't engage with it unless it meets a certain reputational standard.
- ThrowawayR2 6y agoI dunno; I'm tempted to turn on Fox News to analyze which companies advertise on there. I suspect advertisers' squeamishness only runs skin deep and they really don't want to give up ad reach to 40+% of the country. [EDIT] Interesting. According to this link (https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/these-are-fox-news-leading-advertisers https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/these-are-fox-news-lea...), very prominent national brands advertise on Fox News, including Verizon, who recently garnered mention for boycotting Facebook ads. Kind of reinforces my hypothesis.
- jameslk 6y agoI think I see where this is going: Twitter will be the new CNN and Parler will be the new Fox News, and both will be insufferable politicized dumpster fires just like the old media companies they're replacing.
- Fellshard 6y agoThe polarization of every company to serve one half of a political divide does not seem terribly healthy.
- drewcoo 6y agoBecause it deserts the other half of the public, because it doesn't make for a large enough addressable market, both, or other?
- 29083011397778 6y agoLikely in relation to "One Nation, indivisible, under God" (emphasis mine, quoted from the pledge of allegiance.) A nation so divided it needs two of every company seems brittle and fragile.
- Fellshard 6y agoIt seems like two nations, in the end.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- geofft 6y agoThese are the guidelines of this "free speech social network": https://legal.parler.com/documents/guidelines.pdf https://legal.parler.com/documents/guidelines.pdf Apart from the clear US-centric worldview of acceptable and unacceptable speech (e.g., using the US list of foreign terrorist organizations - for instance, many countries would not consider Hezbollah a terrorist organization), I don't understand the "fighting words" portion. It references a US Supreme Court case, Terminiello v. Chicago, in which the speaker was ruled to have not been a "clear and present danger" or have used "fighting words" - so it's not clear what "fighting words" are. The term was defined in an earlier case, Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, where it was ruled that calling someone "a damned fascist" was not protected by the First Amendment - is that the point of view that Parler takes? Meanwhile, in US jurisprudence, the "clear and present danger" test was replaced by the "imminent lawless action" one in 1969 (Brandenburg v. Ohio), which specifically constitutionally guarantees quite a bit more free speech, including non-imminent advocacy of breaking laws. Does Parler follow the "clear and present danger" standard or the "imminent lawless action" one? Also, the network bans "pornography," "obscenity," and "indecency" (which goes farther than the FCC, which permits "indecent" content on TV or the radio between 10 pm and 6 am, and doesn't regulate them in print etc.) and adds the suggestion, "Make sure everyone in your photos has clothes." Are shirtless men acceptable? Shirtless women (permitted in public in at least six US states)? Are medical diagrams acceptable? (Content is merely indecent and not obscene if it has "serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value".)
- noobaccount 6y agoThis submission seems to have been censored; it has fallen off the front page of HN. I signed up for Parler. It seems refreshingly welcoming to me. That might be problematic for those currently censoring existing spaces.
- solzhenitsyn 6y agoDisappeared from the front page after just a few minutes.
- thu2111 6y agoIsn't that curious. There's nothing objectionable or off topic about this story, yet it's flagged. I suspect this is liberals trying to ensure nobody finds out about forums they can't censor. The first thing censors always censor is news about uncensored alternatives.
- emerged 6y agoPerhaps there could be a new internet standard which allows every website in existence to run parallel political left/right instances. Segment ourselves into two entirely separate realities since we clearly aren't able to get along together.
- datavirtue 6y agoMassive audience. Users don't care. Ads. Users don't want. Solutions for which there is no problem.
- scarface74 6y agoAnd this is how it should work Instead of whining about “regulating tech” every time they do something you don’t like, create your own platform where like minded individuals are free to congregate. It’s surprising that so many conservative groups who are the first to want deregulation and the free market when it suits them wanted government interference when big tech was being mean to them.
- emerged 6y agoIt's not "being mean" it's being unable to participate in discussions when you don't tow the line. This is true on Twitter and Reddit, even HN. You are also not supposed to even bring up the issue as that will be down regulated even more heavily. The problem needs to be solved one way or another because things are spiralling out of control. The solution isn't "conservatives should just stop not saying what I want them to say" as that will never happen.
- scarface74 6y agoSure. If you want to have a discussion where you don’t have to be dependent on other people’s rules. Create your own forum. That’s how you solve it. The open source community didn’t just complain about the closed source products that other vendors released. They created their own alternatives. Why can’t conservatives come up with successful forums? Are there no conservative entrepreneurs with the technological wherewithal?
- emerged 6y agoJust as systemic racism can occur in institutions, systemic bias can occur in the technology sector. Once momentum builds in a political direction, there becomes a cost associated with going against that grain. Over time it has built up to a breaking point where dissent from that bias effectively removes people from being able to participate. I think it's not intellectually honest to believe systemic issues in one instance require intervention, but not in the other.
- 6y ago