Following his suspension from Twitter and Instagram for anti-Semitic posts, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West has offered to buy the right-wing welcoming social network Parler.
With the acquisition of Parler, West, also known legally as Ye, would gain control of a social media platform as well as a new outlet for his opinions with no intermediary. Who will listen is the question.
Even with the new breed of largely right-wing, far-right, and liberal social apps that claim to support free speech by having laxer rules and moderation, Parler’s user base is tiny also with competition for the relatively small swath mostly of older people who want to discuss politics online only increasing, there is no clear blueprint to expanding it beyond a niche platform chasing crumbs.
If Tesla CEO Elon Musk goes ahead with his planned acquisition of Twitter, things could become even more complex for Parler.
That’s because Musk has already stated his desire to relax Twitter’s rules and content-moderation endeavours, including the reinstatement of former President Donald Trump’s account.
If the liberal and far-right users who left Twitter either because they felt it was too restrictive to their political opinions or because they were kicked off return, sites like Parler, Gab, and Trump’s Truth Social may suffer a user loss.
Parlement Technologies, which owns Parler, and West announced the acquisition on Monday, saying it would be completed in the fourth quarter, but no price or other details were revealed.
According to Parlement Technologies, the agreement includes the use of private and data center infrastructure.
Last month, Parler reconfigured its business to form Parlement Technologies, with the goal of becoming the “world’s premier free speech technology infrastructure and platform.” This means that, rather than focusing on a single platform like Parler, the company intends to offer a service to other niche sites that are frequently deemed too extreme for mainstream tech companies to endorse.
According to a spokesperson for Parlement, the agreement with West was not yet in the works when the firm was restructured, and the two transactions are distinct. Ye was barred from posting on Instagram and Twitter a week ago for making anti-Semitic comments that the social media platforms claimed violated their policies. According to one Twitter post, Ye stated that he would soon go “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE.” A reference to DEFCON a U.S defense readiness condition.
Ye has also implied that slavery is an option and that the COVID-19 vaccine is the “mark of the beast.” He was chastised earlier this month for wearing a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt to his Paris Fashion Week show.
“In a world where conservative views are regarded as controversial, we must ensure our freedom to freely express ourselves,” Ye said in a press statement.
Parler has struggled in the midst of competition from other right wing platforms such as Truth Social, which are also small in comparison to mainstream social media platforms.
According to Data.ai, which tracks mobile app usage, Parler had an estimate of 725,000 monthly active users in the United States during the first half of this year. This is a decrease from 5.2 million during the first half of 2021. Overall, including people outside the United States, Parler fell short of the 1 million mark during the first half of this year.
According to Data.ai, Truth Social had 2.4 million monthly active users during the same period even after only launching in February and only working on Apple devices. According to the market research firm, Gettr, which will launch in July 2021, is ahead of both Parler as well as Truth Social with approximately 3.8m monthly active users.
Neither one them come near to Twitter, which confirmed 237.8 million active users on a daily basis during the latest quarter.
Many right-wing platforms arose in response to content restrictions at mainstream services such as Facebook and Twitter but they have been unable to attract a large number of users.
One reason could be that most people do not want to debate politics online. According to the Pew Research Center, one-third of tweets sent in the United States are political, but these are mostly sent by a small subset of mostly older people.
While Americans aged 50 and up account for 24% of the adult Twitter population in the United States, they account for nearly 80% of all political tweets according to PEW the exact audience Parler will have to engage if Parler is to grow.
Parler was launched in August 2018, but it didn’t gain traction until 2020. It was decommissioned in January 2021 due to its ties to the devastating insurgency at the United States Capitol that same month. Parler proclaimed a relaunch a month after the attack. It was re-released on Google Play last month.
In a press statement, Parlement Technologies CEO George Farmer, who is husband to conservative activist Candace Owens, said, “This deal will transform the world, and alter the way the world thinks about freedom of speech.”
