The stupidest possible take on things always seems to rise to the top of social media.
First, I fully agree that the entire mobile ecosystem is walled-garden first. That should be addressed to a greater degree than sideloading apps on android. Second, the idea that this is 'monopolistic' seems deeply silly. Parler isn't offline because Amazon, the only provider of web services, told them to get off the internet. It's offline because Amazon and most of their specialized service providers (twilio, etc) kicked them off as well as all of those service providers' competitors. This is not an example of monopolistic power. It's an example of an entire industry choosing to reject a company they find odious. This is very similar to what happened with Stormfront some years ago[1].
Still, this is troubling. I feel like it's reasonable to see Parler as acting in bad faith. It seems to me like they knowingly fostered an environment that would lead to militants using the service to plan attacks. I think they protest too much.
I also think that hosting truly "free" speech in an ethical way is enormously, obviously difficult. Threats are genuinely hard to evaluate and must be taken seriously. Mass communication has been at the center of all the modern genocides (and early forms of communication were key to the older ones). I think this is the discussion we should be having - what is the "right" way to create a space where people are save to speak? How could Parler have existed to allow people to speak their minds while preventing the platform from providing aid to violent hate groups? I suspect it's impossible to allow people to speak freely about their belief that other people are not human without fomenting violence but it's clear that not everyone agrees with that and I think we need to talk about it.
P.s. Quite sad to see that Greenwald has descended into red-faced sputtering grievance-listing. I agree that the moral case for shutting down Parler and shutting down Facebook is the same. I think both should be shut down for fomenting and planning violence. We can reopen both of them when we figure out how to more effectively stop their use in violence. I didn't even need ten paragraphs to say it.
First, I fully agree that the entire mobile ecosystem is walled-garden first. That should be addressed to a greater degree than sideloading apps on android. Second, the idea that this is 'monopolistic' seems deeply silly. Parler isn't offline because Amazon, the only provider of web services, told them to get off the internet. It's offline because Amazon and most of their specialized service providers (twilio, etc) kicked them off as well as all of those service providers' competitors. This is not an example of monopolistic power. It's an example of an entire industry choosing to reject a company they find odious. This is very similar to what happened with Stormfront some years ago[1].
Still, this is troubling. I feel like it's reasonable to see Parler as acting in bad faith. It seems to me like they knowingly fostered an environment that would lead to militants using the service to plan attacks. I think they protest too much.
I also think that hosting truly "free" speech in an ethical way is enormously, obviously difficult. Threats are genuinely hard to evaluate and must be taken seriously. Mass communication has been at the center of all the modern genocides (and early forms of communication were key to the older ones). I think this is the discussion we should be having - what is the "right" way to create a space where people are save to speak? How could Parler have existed to allow people to speak their minds while preventing the platform from providing aid to violent hate groups? I suspect it's impossible to allow people to speak freely about their belief that other people are not human without fomenting violence but it's clear that not everyone agrees with that and I think we need to talk about it.
P.s. Quite sad to see that Greenwald has descended into red-faced sputtering grievance-listing. I agree that the moral case for shutting down Parler and shutting down Facebook is the same. I think both should be shut down for fomenting and planning violence. We can reopen both of them when we figure out how to more effectively stop their use in violence. I didn't even need ten paragraphs to say it.
[1] https://slate.com/technology/2017/08/stormfront-has-been-kic...