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Parler now looks to be hosted through a company called SkySilk: parler.com. IN A 216.246.208.249 https://rdap.arin.net/registry/ip/216.246.208.0 https://r

Parler now looks to be hosted through a company called SkySilk: parler.com. IN A 216.246.208.249 https://rdap.arin.net/registry/ip/216.246.208.0 https://rdap.arin.net/registry/ip/216.246.208.0 SkySilk appears to specialize in VPCs and cloud hosting, not colocation. Their AUP doesn't appear to give Parler much relief either[1]: > We specifically reserve the right to refuse to provide the Service to customers or End Users engaged in the dissemination of material that may cause us to be subject to attacks on our network, or that while technically legal, run counter to our corporate principles. I can't imagine this arrangement lasts too long. [1]: https://www.skysilk.com/aup/ https://www.skysilk.com/aup/

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
thepangolino 6y ago
I personally never understood the the appeal of Parler, be it on a technical standpoint or privacy and freedom of speech. Especially compared to Gab.
- jmcan 6y ago
  You can't even sign up without a phone number. Never got an account or went on just for this reason alone.
  - rvz 6y ago
    My point exactly why I don't use services that do this. Signal, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram and all the like. It is plain silly to require phone number verification as a 'security mechanism'
    - ampdepolymerase 6y ago
      The engineering of Gab (politics aside) is probably worthy of a front page HN post. They run on Mastodon and their entire codebase is open source.
      - eternalban 6y ago
        "We have diverged from Mastodon in several ways in pursuit of our own goals. [...]" https://code.gab.com/gab/social/gab-social/-/blob/develop/README.md https://code.gab.com/gab/social/gab-social/-/blob/develop/RE...
        cobraetor 6y ago
        They started out as a Mastodon node, and then got blocked by the wider Fediverse. https://blog.alexgleason.me/gab-block/ https://blog.alexgleason.me/gab-block/
        eternalban 6y ago
        I laughed when his link to his article turned up a 404 at medium with account suspended. Not entirely sure yet if it was a morbid or cynical laugh. At a more technical level, do we need a 4xx code for "memory holed"? Was this an oversight of the IETF, or should Medium and other discerning and socially responsible content providers use the other available 4xx codes? Here, 404 "not found" is a pretty lie. We could start off with the basic 400 "bad request". This is closer to the truth. In fact, it is too close to the truth because it means "client error". (Is it a crime yet to click on "not found" articles?) So, ok, let's try 401 "unauthorized". This is still better than "not found" but, again, just a bit too honest. But, really, Medium.com should be responding with 403 "Forbidden". This is the unvarnished truth from the mouth of the server. 403 - Forbidden: "The request contained valid data and was understood by the server, but the server is refusing action. This may be due to the user not having the necessary permissions for a resource or needing an account of some sort, or attempting a prohibited action e.g. creating a duplicate record where only one is allowed)."
        Shish2k 6y ago
        "HTTP 451 - Unavailable For Legal Reasons” seems to be getting close?
    - onlyfortoday2 6y ago
      It is plain silly to require phone number verification as a 'security mechanism why?
      - camdenlock 6y ago
        There’s nothing secure about phone numbers, receiving secret codes via SMS, etc
        vbezhenar 6y ago
        It is secure enough and it is the only reliable second factor to authorize that almost everyone possess.
        da_big_ghey 6y ago
        It is less universal than e-mail (and potentially less-secure), and certainly less secure than TOTP. It also costs money, whereas the former two can be had for free.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        Isn’t email hard to set up though? As in, Gmail silently dropping your emails even with DKIM set up properly? There’s services you can pay to have more luck, but then you’re at the same downside as texting
        da_big_ghey 6y ago
        Yes, it absolutely is (though I do still run my own). I do know that it's easier than setting up a phone provider, however, which is more equivalent to setting up one's own ISP.
        bradford 6y ago
        A phone isn't being used alone though. It's just one part of a 2FA system, right?
    - elipsey 6y ago
      i have simply assumed that the purpose of this requirement generally is for the platform owner to establish your real identity for monetization and/or indemnification, and that any benefit to the user is incidental. who ever said that "security" meant yours? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
      - ratsmack 6y ago
        It's more of a bot prevention mechanism than identification, however, I believe it encourages people to be more responsible for what they post also.
        rvz 6y ago
        Well a captcha does just that without a phone number.
        ratsmack 6y ago
        People will think twice about posting threats, child porn, and other illicit things when they have some skin in the game. This definitely cuts down on moderation requirements.
    - ufmace 6y ago
      I think those who think this misunderstand the type of security it is meant to provide. It's not about blocking account takeover attempts. Services mostly don't really care about that, because it doesn't affect the service as a whole. It's about reducing spam, bots, and other organized hostile activity towards the service as a whole. It's tough to create a bunch of accounts in a way that the site can't easily track if you have to provide a real phone number. Yes, everybody knows about buying phone services on the internet, and they do seem to have ways to block using those numbers. Pretty much every service does this. Try signing up for a Google, Facebook, or Twitter account without providing a real phone number. Usually if it works at all, the account created will be rapidly blocked until you do provide one.
      - rvz 6y ago
        Then I will get spam through my phone number then each time I register it for 'SMS authentication'. Then you'll later ask how did these services not only get my phone number, but also upload my entire address book for 'security reasons'. A captcha is more than enough.
        ufmace 6y ago
        You're right that you may get a lot of noisy authentication spam texts. Alas, none of the companies involved seem to care. Judging by their popularity, most of their users don't seem to care much either. Is a captcha enough? I've never worked in bot/spam mitigation for a large public platform before, so I don't really know. Based on how universal phone number requirements are for these services, and how much trouble they seem to have gone to in order to block using easily purchased numbers, I'm going to guess that captchas aren't enough.
        Can_Not 6y ago
        It's hard to say captchas are or aren't enough because you know most companies just want your phone number for ulterior motives.
  - api 6y ago
    Parler asks for an absurd amount of PII. I always figured it was a way for the Mercer crowd to assemble a dossier on the extreme right for use in future highly targeted mobilization efforts.
    - _-david-_ 6y ago
      Which PII? I never created an account but my understanding was name, email and phone number which is no different than most social media.
      - caseysoftware 6y ago
        Exactly, this is misinformation. The only time they request additional PII is for verification. (As a security & privacy advocate with a job in the space, I dug into this last summer and again just before the January shutdown. It was never true just for signing up.)
      - ConceptJunkie 6y ago
        My experience was the same. I did pause at the phone number requirement, but frankly, it's not that uncommon, and is useful for 2FA.
    - jmcan 6y ago
      I don't want to be all conspiratorial or anything but wasn't Parler hacked during the Capitol Hill protest and a bunch of protesters where caught? To me this seems like a successful honeypot.
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  It's all network effect. Parler somehow got some endorsements by well known Republicans like Hannity and Trump at a time when people on the right were looking to switch to something else, so they ended up with a lot more users than Gab.
  - 542458 6y ago
    Parler is bankrolled by Robert Mercer who absolutely has the network to get those kinds of endorsements.
    - ratsmack 6y ago
      I always worry about the objectives and goals behind the people in the shadows injecting money into projects like this. Twitter started off as an open forum, but look at it now.
- AzzieElbab 6y ago
  It is not about the appeal, it is about contempt towards Twitter. Also Gab is a bit hard to approach for Parler crowd
  - EGreg 6y ago
    Why is that?
    - ardy42 6y ago
      >> It is not about the appeal, it is about contempt towards Twitter. Also Gab is a bit hard to approach for Parler crowd > Why is that? IIRC, it's even more extreme (e.g. full of outspoken and unapologetic racists talking about racist things in racist terms).
      - AzzieElbab 6y ago
        i joined parler to follow zerohedge and dr.zelenko. both accounts were flickering on twitter ... banned/un-banned/banned/un-banned
        Sunspark 6y ago
        You can follow zerohedge on their website..
        AzzieElbab 6y ago
        their tweets too?
      - scarygliders 6y ago
        Which is a direct result of a platform which allows free speech - including speech which neither you nor I may not like. But to me, free speech means anyone can speak their mind, no matter how ghastly others find it. And on Gab, I have encountered some pretty unsavoury speech - however, copious use of the Block feature on those I find especially distasteful means that I encounter less of those I find as such. I'd rather have a platform based on free speech and be able to filter 'undesirables' out myself, than have the platform itself choose the speech it prefers me to see/hear/read.
- devwastaken 6y ago
  Most users of parlor are not technical people and don't understand anything about it. The reason why parlor got popular is because it was easy for disinformation to be spread and people want to believe in it. For example when that at&t network center was bombed there was a fake image going around that it "wasn't the van that exploded". I had someone try to "prove to me" it was true by linking me to parlor and it's users creating conspiracies on top of conspiracies. The users there will accept disinformation and made up conspiracies if it benefits their team. That's sadly the reality of it. People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. They don't understand the concept of people can and will lie freeley behind a camera or keyboard. A classical example of "my ignorance is just as good as your education because I don't know any better."
  - fooker 6y ago
    > People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. Do you understand the physics and engineering of all the tech you use?
    - true_religion 6y ago
      There's obviously a difference between the broad understanding OP is talking about, and the low-level physics that goes into a computer. Also, one could say that there's a stark difference between saying people who do not understand how misinformation works on a platform should not use that platform, and for example saying people who don't understand toasters shouldn't use toasters. For the record, I don't understand the low level physics of toasters. As far as I know, they're magic bagel browning devices.
      - fooker 6y ago
        A toaster has fairly benign failure modes, so this strawman isn't really a reasonable one. Though I hope you understand toasters enough not to trigger your smoke alarm every time.
  - caseysoftware 6y ago
    > People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. Your elitist, anti-inclusive rhetoric is unnecessary. > They don't understand the concept of people can and will lie freeley behind a camera or keyboard. If one of the main claims is "the media lies" then obviously they understand that. There are valid criticisms but these are not them.
- Splognosticus 6y ago
  I sorta get it, from the standpoint of just allowing folks to speak their mind without repercussions. Unfortunately in practice that invariably drifts to being somewhere that the worst dregs of society congregate because they aren't welcome anywhere else, and then, well, your site becomes the cesspool that Parler was. :\
  - ConceptJunkie 6y ago
    It seems there are only endpoints: an echo chamber or a cesspool. All the "mainstream" social media sites are converging on the former. What can you do if you don't want an echo chamber?
    - jfengel 6y ago
      I believe the "echo chamber" concept is overrated. It's really not difficult to go out and find somebody representing the other side of an argument. You can construct yourself an echo chamber if you want, but you don't automatically get one. The narrative that reasonable points of view are being censored out of existence is part of a narrative constructed to leverage the right-wing persecution complex. There are plenty of right wingers all over social media; it's chock full of them. But that persecution complex has turned into violence, and that complex is perfectly positioned to pretend that trying to stem violence is censorship. (They didn't seem to mind when it was being used to fight anti-American terrorism.) If you don't want an echo chamber, don't make one. Seek out sensible people with different points of view, which is no harder than taking up an interest in ballet dancing or Malaysian cuisine. They weren't being excluded from your non-ballet-mee-goreng-free circle. You're not required to give equal time to conspiracy theorists -- and there do exist non-conspiracy-theorist right wingers to talk to, if that's what you want. Social media isn't banning them. The ones who are being banned are using that language to pretend that there's a different reason.
- ejanus 6y ago
  What is GB and Twitter appeal?
bpodgursky 6y ago
I strongly suspect they had conversations with SkySilk before moving their services there. Also, that's a very standard provider clause. No company is going to promise to serve anyone, anywhere, even if they don't want to.
- EGreg 6y ago
  IPFS and MaidSAFE will
  - bpodgursky 6y ago
    I mean, sure, there are companies trying to build a decentralized web, but I think that's different that saying an individual hosting provider will keep you online. This feels like saying "The Tor network will keep you online". You still need someone providing hardware and electricity. Unless I'm missing something about these offerings.
    - vbezhenar 6y ago
      > This feels like saying "The Tor network will keep you online". You still need someone providing hardware and electricity. Unless I'm missing something about these offerings. Nobody but you knows that you're hosting hidden tor service. One need to perform a sophisticated attack to discover its location. You can buy VPS from Amazon and host your hidden tor service there and Amazon guys won't have a clue until NSA guys will come to them.
      - wmf 6y ago
        That's true but it's fairly specific to Tor and maybe Freenet. Most decentralized systems don't use onion routing so it's easy to trace any piece of public content back to where it's hosted.
        techprivvy 6y ago
        On Safe Network (developed by Maidsafe) * data is self encrypted client side * IP is scrubbed and given a Kademlia or XOR address? I forget exactly * qp2p (QUIC implementation in rustlang w/extra features) encrypts traffic * nodes can’t choose their disjoint section (shard) and are randomly relocated (churn). Nodes are made up from a ‘Safe’ (previously called ‘Vault’) executable file and some spare space on disk of everyday computers. Nodes first go through a short PoW resource proof so the network knows the nodes capabilities and how to place them. Sybil attacks are prevented in many ways including random placement in sections and random relocation, and node ageing, which is a way of incremental responsibility when a node behaves all the way into the next relocation event and that is halved if misbehaving or offline. You would have to control a significant portion of the network to cause a problem and would be cost prohibitive in most cases. In a young network the highest risk comes from a ‘Google attack’ where they deliberately allocate their resources early on and either try to control the consensus or rug pull their resources which would cause massive data loss. Safe Network also has Safe Network Token (SN) as an digital payment/incentive layer for providing or purchasing network resources (bandwidth/cpu/storage). If you think CRDT’s or Asynchronous Trutworthy Transfers (AT2) are neat innovations you should definitely check it out as Maidsafe is really pushing the envelope there. safenetforum.org https://primer.safenetwork.org/ https://primer.safenetwork.org/
cbdumas 6y ago
Also this bullet point under "Lawful Purposes Only": > Acting in any manner that might subject us to unfavorable regulatory action, subject us to any liability for any reason, or adversely affect our public image, reputation or goodwill, as determined by us in our sole and exclusive discretion.
jimmy2020 6y ago
From NYT: > It was unclear how Parler had figured out how to host its site on computer servers, the central technology underpinning any website. Many of the large web-hosting firms had previously rejected it. For other services required to run a large website, Parler relied on help from a Russian firm that once worked for the Russian government and a Seattle firm that once supported a neo-Nazi site. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/technology/parler-back-online.html?smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&smtyp=cur https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/technology/parler-back-on... Wondering how they reached this conclusion and based on what the report didn't even mention the company name.
- ratsmack 6y ago
  >Russian firm that once worked for the Russian government and a Seattle firm that once supported a neo-Nazi site. They just can't give it up.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

thepangolino 6y ago

I personally never understood the the appeal of Parler, be it on a technical standpoint or privacy and freedom of speech. Especially compared to Gab.

jmcan 6y ago
You can't even sign up without a phone number. Never got an account or went on just for this reason alone.
- rvz 6y ago
  My point exactly why I don't use services that do this. Signal, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram and all the like. It is plain silly to require phone number verification as a 'security mechanism'
  - ampdepolymerase 6y ago
    The engineering of Gab (politics aside) is probably worthy of a front page HN post. They run on Mastodon and their entire codebase is open source.
    - eternalban 6y ago
      "We have diverged from Mastodon in several ways in pursuit of our own goals. [...]" https://code.gab.com/gab/social/gab-social/-/blob/develop/README.md https://code.gab.com/gab/social/gab-social/-/blob/develop/RE...
      - cobraetor 6y ago
        They started out as a Mastodon node, and then got blocked by the wider Fediverse. https://blog.alexgleason.me/gab-block/ https://blog.alexgleason.me/gab-block/
        eternalban 6y ago
        I laughed when his link to his article turned up a 404 at medium with account suspended. Not entirely sure yet if it was a morbid or cynical laugh. At a more technical level, do we need a 4xx code for "memory holed"? Was this an oversight of the IETF, or should Medium and other discerning and socially responsible content providers use the other available 4xx codes? Here, 404 "not found" is a pretty lie. We could start off with the basic 400 "bad request". This is closer to the truth. In fact, it is too close to the truth because it means "client error". (Is it a crime yet to click on "not found" articles?) So, ok, let's try 401 "unauthorized". This is still better than "not found" but, again, just a bit too honest. But, really, Medium.com should be responding with 403 "Forbidden". This is the unvarnished truth from the mouth of the server. 403 - Forbidden: "The request contained valid data and was understood by the server, but the server is refusing action. This may be due to the user not having the necessary permissions for a resource or needing an account of some sort, or attempting a prohibited action e.g. creating a duplicate record where only one is allowed)."
        Shish2k 6y ago
        "HTTP 451 - Unavailable For Legal Reasons” seems to be getting close?
  - onlyfortoday2 6y ago
    It is plain silly to require phone number verification as a 'security mechanism why?
    - camdenlock 6y ago
      There’s nothing secure about phone numbers, receiving secret codes via SMS, etc
      - vbezhenar 6y ago
        It is secure enough and it is the only reliable second factor to authorize that almost everyone possess.
        da_big_ghey 6y ago
        It is less universal than e-mail (and potentially less-secure), and certainly less secure than TOTP. It also costs money, whereas the former two can be had for free.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        Isn’t email hard to set up though? As in, Gmail silently dropping your emails even with DKIM set up properly? There’s services you can pay to have more luck, but then you’re at the same downside as texting
        da_big_ghey 6y ago
        Yes, it absolutely is (though I do still run my own). I do know that it's easier than setting up a phone provider, however, which is more equivalent to setting up one's own ISP.
      - bradford 6y ago
        A phone isn't being used alone though. It's just one part of a 2FA system, right?
  - elipsey 6y ago
    i have simply assumed that the purpose of this requirement generally is for the platform owner to establish your real identity for monetization and/or indemnification, and that any benefit to the user is incidental. who ever said that "security" meant yours? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    - ratsmack 6y ago
      It's more of a bot prevention mechanism than identification, however, I believe it encourages people to be more responsible for what they post also.
      - rvz 6y ago
        Well a captcha does just that without a phone number.
        ratsmack 6y ago
        People will think twice about posting threats, child porn, and other illicit things when they have some skin in the game. This definitely cuts down on moderation requirements.
  - ufmace 6y ago
    I think those who think this misunderstand the type of security it is meant to provide. It's not about blocking account takeover attempts. Services mostly don't really care about that, because it doesn't affect the service as a whole. It's about reducing spam, bots, and other organized hostile activity towards the service as a whole. It's tough to create a bunch of accounts in a way that the site can't easily track if you have to provide a real phone number. Yes, everybody knows about buying phone services on the internet, and they do seem to have ways to block using those numbers. Pretty much every service does this. Try signing up for a Google, Facebook, or Twitter account without providing a real phone number. Usually if it works at all, the account created will be rapidly blocked until you do provide one.
    - rvz 6y ago
      Then I will get spam through my phone number then each time I register it for 'SMS authentication'. Then you'll later ask how did these services not only get my phone number, but also upload my entire address book for 'security reasons'. A captcha is more than enough.
      - ufmace 6y ago
        You're right that you may get a lot of noisy authentication spam texts. Alas, none of the companies involved seem to care. Judging by their popularity, most of their users don't seem to care much either. Is a captcha enough? I've never worked in bot/spam mitigation for a large public platform before, so I don't really know. Based on how universal phone number requirements are for these services, and how much trouble they seem to have gone to in order to block using easily purchased numbers, I'm going to guess that captchas aren't enough.
        Can_Not 6y ago
        It's hard to say captchas are or aren't enough because you know most companies just want your phone number for ulterior motives.
- api 6y ago
  Parler asks for an absurd amount of PII. I always figured it was a way for the Mercer crowd to assemble a dossier on the extreme right for use in future highly targeted mobilization efforts.
  - _-david-_ 6y ago
    Which PII? I never created an account but my understanding was name, email and phone number which is no different than most social media.
    - caseysoftware 6y ago
      Exactly, this is misinformation. The only time they request additional PII is for verification. (As a security & privacy advocate with a job in the space, I dug into this last summer and again just before the January shutdown. It was never true just for signing up.)
    - ConceptJunkie 6y ago
      My experience was the same. I did pause at the phone number requirement, but frankly, it's not that uncommon, and is useful for 2FA.
  - jmcan 6y ago
    I don't want to be all conspiratorial or anything but wasn't Parler hacked during the Capitol Hill protest and a bunch of protesters where caught? To me this seems like a successful honeypot.
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
It's all network effect. Parler somehow got some endorsements by well known Republicans like Hannity and Trump at a time when people on the right were looking to switch to something else, so they ended up with a lot more users than Gab.
- 542458 6y ago
  Parler is bankrolled by Robert Mercer who absolutely has the network to get those kinds of endorsements.
  - ratsmack 6y ago
    I always worry about the objectives and goals behind the people in the shadows injecting money into projects like this. Twitter started off as an open forum, but look at it now.
AzzieElbab 6y ago
It is not about the appeal, it is about contempt towards Twitter. Also Gab is a bit hard to approach for Parler crowd
- EGreg 6y ago
  Why is that?
  - ardy42 6y ago
    >> It is not about the appeal, it is about contempt towards Twitter. Also Gab is a bit hard to approach for Parler crowd > Why is that? IIRC, it's even more extreme (e.g. full of outspoken and unapologetic racists talking about racist things in racist terms).
    - AzzieElbab 6y ago
      i joined parler to follow zerohedge and dr.zelenko. both accounts were flickering on twitter ... banned/un-banned/banned/un-banned
      - Sunspark 6y ago
        You can follow zerohedge on their website..
        AzzieElbab 6y ago
        their tweets too?
    - scarygliders 6y ago
      Which is a direct result of a platform which allows free speech - including speech which neither you nor I may not like. But to me, free speech means anyone can speak their mind, no matter how ghastly others find it. And on Gab, I have encountered some pretty unsavoury speech - however, copious use of the Block feature on those I find especially distasteful means that I encounter less of those I find as such. I'd rather have a platform based on free speech and be able to filter 'undesirables' out myself, than have the platform itself choose the speech it prefers me to see/hear/read.
devwastaken 6y ago
Most users of parlor are not technical people and don't understand anything about it. The reason why parlor got popular is because it was easy for disinformation to be spread and people want to believe in it. For example when that at&t network center was bombed there was a fake image going around that it "wasn't the van that exploded". I had someone try to "prove to me" it was true by linking me to parlor and it's users creating conspiracies on top of conspiracies. The users there will accept disinformation and made up conspiracies if it benefits their team. That's sadly the reality of it. People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. They don't understand the concept of people can and will lie freeley behind a camera or keyboard. A classical example of "my ignorance is just as good as your education because I don't know any better."
- fooker 6y ago
  > People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. Do you understand the physics and engineering of all the tech you use?
  - true_religion 6y ago
    There's obviously a difference between the broad understanding OP is talking about, and the low-level physics that goes into a computer. Also, one could say that there's a stark difference between saying people who do not understand how misinformation works on a platform should not use that platform, and for example saying people who don't understand toasters shouldn't use toasters. For the record, I don't understand the low level physics of toasters. As far as I know, they're magic bagel browning devices.
    - fooker 6y ago
      A toaster has fairly benign failure modes, so this strawman isn't really a reasonable one. Though I hope you understand toasters enough not to trigger your smoke alarm every time.
- caseysoftware 6y ago
  > People that don't understand tech should not be on the internet. Your elitist, anti-inclusive rhetoric is unnecessary. > They don't understand the concept of people can and will lie freeley behind a camera or keyboard. If one of the main claims is "the media lies" then obviously they understand that. There are valid criticisms but these are not them.
Splognosticus 6y ago
I sorta get it, from the standpoint of just allowing folks to speak their mind without repercussions. Unfortunately in practice that invariably drifts to being somewhere that the worst dregs of society congregate because they aren't welcome anywhere else, and then, well, your site becomes the cesspool that Parler was. :\
- ConceptJunkie 6y ago
  It seems there are only endpoints: an echo chamber or a cesspool. All the "mainstream" social media sites are converging on the former. What can you do if you don't want an echo chamber?
  - jfengel 6y ago
    I believe the "echo chamber" concept is overrated. It's really not difficult to go out and find somebody representing the other side of an argument. You can construct yourself an echo chamber if you want, but you don't automatically get one. The narrative that reasonable points of view are being censored out of existence is part of a narrative constructed to leverage the right-wing persecution complex. There are plenty of right wingers all over social media; it's chock full of them. But that persecution complex has turned into violence, and that complex is perfectly positioned to pretend that trying to stem violence is censorship. (They didn't seem to mind when it was being used to fight anti-American terrorism.) If you don't want an echo chamber, don't make one. Seek out sensible people with different points of view, which is no harder than taking up an interest in ballet dancing or Malaysian cuisine. They weren't being excluded from your non-ballet-mee-goreng-free circle. You're not required to give equal time to conspiracy theorists -- and there do exist non-conspiracy-theorist right wingers to talk to, if that's what you want. Social media isn't banning them. The ones who are being banned are using that language to pretend that there's a different reason.
ejanus 6y ago
What is GB and Twitter appeal?

bpodgursky 6y ago

I strongly suspect they had conversations with SkySilk before moving their services there. Also, that's a very standard provider clause. No company is going to promise to serve anyone, anywhere, even if they don't want to.

EGreg 6y ago
IPFS and MaidSAFE will
- bpodgursky 6y ago
  I mean, sure, there are companies trying to build a decentralized web, but I think that's different that saying an individual hosting provider will keep you online. This feels like saying "The Tor network will keep you online". You still need someone providing hardware and electricity. Unless I'm missing something about these offerings.
  - vbezhenar 6y ago
    > This feels like saying "The Tor network will keep you online". You still need someone providing hardware and electricity. Unless I'm missing something about these offerings. Nobody but you knows that you're hosting hidden tor service. One need to perform a sophisticated attack to discover its location. You can buy VPS from Amazon and host your hidden tor service there and Amazon guys won't have a clue until NSA guys will come to them.
    - wmf 6y ago
      That's true but it's fairly specific to Tor and maybe Freenet. Most decentralized systems don't use onion routing so it's easy to trace any piece of public content back to where it's hosted.
      - techprivvy 6y ago
        On Safe Network (developed by Maidsafe) * data is self encrypted client side * IP is scrubbed and given a Kademlia or XOR address? I forget exactly * qp2p (QUIC implementation in rustlang w/extra features) encrypts traffic * nodes can’t choose their disjoint section (shard) and are randomly relocated (churn). Nodes are made up from a ‘Safe’ (previously called ‘Vault’) executable file and some spare space on disk of everyday computers. Nodes first go through a short PoW resource proof so the network knows the nodes capabilities and how to place them. Sybil attacks are prevented in many ways including random placement in sections and random relocation, and node ageing, which is a way of incremental responsibility when a node behaves all the way into the next relocation event and that is halved if misbehaving or offline. You would have to control a significant portion of the network to cause a problem and would be cost prohibitive in most cases. In a young network the highest risk comes from a ‘Google attack’ where they deliberately allocate their resources early on and either try to control the consensus or rug pull their resources which would cause massive data loss. Safe Network also has Safe Network Token (SN) as an digital payment/incentive layer for providing or purchasing network resources (bandwidth/cpu/storage). If you think CRDT’s or Asynchronous Trutworthy Transfers (AT2) are neat innovations you should definitely check it out as Maidsafe is really pushing the envelope there. safenetforum.org https://primer.safenetwork.org/ https://primer.safenetwork.org/

cbdumas 6y ago

Also this bullet point under "Lawful Purposes Only": > Acting in any manner that might subject us to unfavorable regulatory action, subject us to any liability for any reason, or adversely affect our public image, reputation or goodwill, as determined by us in our sole and exclusive discretion.

jimmy2020 6y ago

From NYT: > It was unclear how Parler had figured out how to host its site on computer servers, the central technology underpinning any website. Many of the large web-hosting firms had previously rejected it. For other services required to run a large website, Parler relied on help from a Russian firm that once worked for the Russian government and a Seattle firm that once supported a neo-Nazi site. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/technology/parler-back-online.html?smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&smtyp=cur https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/technology/parler-back-on... Wondering how they reached this conclusion and based on what the report didn't even mention the company name.

ratsmack 6y ago
>Russian firm that once worked for the Russian government and a Seattle firm that once supported a neo-Nazi site. They just can't give it up.