Parler
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Parler (French: Parler, lit.: “to talk”, IPA: /paʁ.le/) is an American-based online news aggregator, micro-blogging and social networking website, originally launched by the founders John Matze, Jr. and Jared Thomson; and headquartered in Henderson, Nevada in August 2018. The website claims to aim for freedom of speech and is the alternative to popular counterparts Facebook and Twitter.
On January 8th, 2021, two days after the the 2021 Capitol Hill Raid, Google Play Store pulled the app. On the ninth, the Apple App Store followed, still on the ninth, Parler was removed from the app store. Amazon Web Service later pulled the website, closing it for good. However, it reopened a week later; albeit with limited functionality. But as of now, the website is now fully back up.
Why It Sucks
- Irony: It claims to support free speech but however does just as much censorship as mainstream social media platforms.
- It can easily be vandalized, thus, it's not that safe to use. Not to mention, its users cause vandalism on other websites.
- Its layout design isn't that great, and you cannot browse content without an account.
- It also has bugs and glitches which occur due its to poor coding design.
- Also its official mobile app will have some bugs as well.
- Lack of data optimization and saver for limited and poor connections that hog your bandwidth exceedingly while you're browsing some posts, thanks to some bloated scripts and heavy images.
- They prevented auto-play for embedded videos from YouTube.
- Mediocre moderation, if it gets you caught for making your posts about something inappropriate to receive a warning or (temporary/permanent) ban when violating the community guidelines.
- Similar to Twitter, you cannot edit your posts or replies.
- Ironically, user profiles and posts are entirely invisible and nowhere because it forbids indexing and archiving.
- Pornography used to be allowed on the site, so it is even easier than Twitter to find porn when you didn’t want to. Luckily, they got rid of it due to concerns.
- While debatable, it is speculated to have played a very large role in the 2021 Capitol Hill Raid.
- To make matters worse, user account deletion is impossible unless you have to contact it through the online form or e-mail.
Redeeming Qualities
- Ironically, Parler is enough to make normal people realize that even censorship can be good in moderation, at least in the case of Pedophiles, terrorists, and criminals.
- The app can serve as a good lesson on why anarchy is bad.
- Thankfully after the relaunch they started to get better moderation and added a trolling filter which shows they at least started to improve.
Trivia
- Their current maximum character limit is 1,000 per each post, which is more than 280 (except Chinese, Japanese, and Korean) on Twitter in comparison.
- On June 13, 2019, 200 thousand Saudi users left Twitter over mass censorship and suspension, and joined the site to support Donald Trump.
- Their official mobile app reached number one in the news section on Apple App Store on June 26, 2020, and later again after Joe Biden's victory of the presidential election on November 9, 2020.
- However, the app quickly lost its position as Number 1 on the App Store after the election.
- On January 29, 2021, Parler board Rebekah Mercer fired John Matze immediately for getting his unfair decision.
- Later Mark Meckler became as interim CEO to take over Parler, which back online with a new hosting provider Epik and relaunched for the second time after the it was removed from Amazon Web Services as of February 15, 2021.
References
- Harding, Jerimiah (June 27, 2020). Parler Review: It’s certainly a thing I guess (archive). Retrieved on July 5, 2020.
- Robinson, Mindy (June 30, 2020). The Problem with Parler: How a Free Speech App Turned Into Anything But (archive). Red, Blue, and F You. Retrieved on July 5, 2020.
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