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yes, with caveats. my opinion on these kinds of topics is always the same. do I object that amazon, apple, and google have kicked hateful content off of their

yes, with caveats. my opinion on these kinds of topics is always the same. do I object that amazon, apple, and google have kicked hateful content off of their own properties? no. do I object that getting blacklisted by a few large tech companies is effectively getting kicked off the entire internet? very much yes.

hawk_ 6y ago
Yes exactly it proves their "monopoly" and will invite antitrust actions in near future. So few individuals shouldn't wield so much power particularly given that they aren't elected even if in this instance they may be correct.
joecot 6y ago
The walled garden app stores are a problem, and it's a problem Progressive Web Apps can solve -- Google and Apple should be required to make PWAs easier to use and more accessible for non technical people. But it is possible to use Parler's PWA, and it's been a bit hilarious watching folks try to explain to each other how to use it. But there are plenty of other places for Parler to host, register domains, etc. There are at least dozens of hosting companies that can do cloud hosting at the scale they need (which isn't exactly huge despite the hype), there are hundreds more that could be used in tandem to cover their needs. Either Parler's inability to handle these moves is a result of them being incapable or unwilling to take slightly more effort in hosting than launching Amazon or Google server instances with a click, or there's an unprecedented amount of unity in companies against Parler. The Gab is still up, Pirate Bay is still up, 8Chan still finds its way onto the internet. The internet is still decentralized. It's the super easy hosting part of the internet that is centralized. It's the hosting that's big enough they don't notice or have any questions about what they're hosting. Parler ran out of hosting companies they could quietly hide inside without someone noticing what they're doing, and in order to find hosting again, they'll have to have an actual conversation with a vendor that sees what Parler is doing and is OK with being a part of it.
crdrost 6y ago
These are most of my caveats. One other: there is a caveat of “given that the system works the way it does right now,” where there is sort of a wild-west approach to these types of big communities, then yeah Google is the sheriff of Play Store and Apple is the sheriff of App Store and Amazon is the sheriff of AWS and they set their rules about how much trouble they want on their streets. But if the overall system were fundamentally different[1], then I would not be so sure; there might be some sort of “due process” expectations then which do not exist for me now. [1] As it may well have to become—those cities were effectively governed that way given population sizes of, what, 10,000 or so? If you have 100 million users and 0.01% of your users can code apps, you have easily that many app developers you have to wrangle.

hawk_ 6y ago

Yes exactly it proves their "monopoly" and will invite antitrust actions in near future. So few individuals shouldn't wield so much power particularly given that they aren't elected even if in this instance they may be correct.

joecot 6y ago

The walled garden app stores are a problem, and it's a problem Progressive Web Apps can solve -- Google and Apple should be required to make PWAs easier to use and more accessible for non technical people. But it is possible to use Parler's PWA, and it's been a bit hilarious watching folks try to explain to each other how to use it. But there are plenty of other places for Parler to host, register domains, etc. There are at least dozens of hosting companies that can do cloud hosting at the scale they need (which isn't exactly huge despite the hype), there are hundreds more that could be used in tandem to cover their needs. Either Parler's inability to handle these moves is a result of them being incapable or unwilling to take slightly more effort in hosting than launching Amazon or Google server instances with a click, or there's an unprecedented amount of unity in companies against Parler. The Gab is still up, Pirate Bay is still up, 8Chan still finds its way onto the internet. The internet is still decentralized. It's the super easy hosting part of the internet that is centralized. It's the hosting that's big enough they don't notice or have any questions about what they're hosting. Parler ran out of hosting companies they could quietly hide inside without someone noticing what they're doing, and in order to find hosting again, they'll have to have an actual conversation with a vendor that sees what Parler is doing and is OK with being a part of it.

crdrost 6y ago

These are most of my caveats. One other: there is a caveat of “given that the system works the way it does right now,” where there is sort of a wild-west approach to these types of big communities, then yeah Google is the sheriff of Play Store and Apple is the sheriff of App Store and Amazon is the sheriff of AWS and they set their rules about how much trouble they want on their streets. But if the overall system were fundamentally different[1], then I would not be so sure; there might be some sort of “due process” expectations then which do not exist for me now. [1] As it may well have to become—those cities were effectively governed that way given population sizes of, what, 10,000 or so? If you have 100 million users and 0.01% of your users can code apps, you have easily that many app developers you have to wrangle.