Angry Parler users flock to Gab

Tens of thousands of Parler users are jumping ship to Gab after Parler was effectively shut down yesterday.

Social media site Gab. Picture: AFP

Hello and welcome to The Download, The Australian’s technology blog for the latest tech news.

Chris Griffith 12.40pm: Angry Parler users flock to Gab

Tens of thousands of users of conservative social media outlet Parler are jumping ship to alternative Gab.com to get back online.

The decisions by Amazon, Apple and Google to blacklist Parler forced it offline yesterday. Apple and Google both withdrew support for the Parler app, while Amazon said it was withdrawing its server support offered through Amazon Web Services.

The tech companies say Parler failed to moderate posts that incite violence.

Parler prides itself on almost unrestricted freedom of speech and minimal vetting of posted material.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that Gab allows hate speech, and it’s regarded as a haven for right wing extremists. However, in contrast to Parler, Gab says it has a policy of vetting content encouraging violent actions.

“Journalists and researchers desperately hunting for ‘bad’ content on our site will almost certainly find it,” says CEO Andrew Torba in a Gab post today, adding. “We‘re getting roughly the population of Boston joining the site every 24 hours.”

Torba claimed last week Gab was gaining 10,000 new users per hour after Mr Trump’s Twitter account was banned.

He says users who find unlawful content should report it to Gab’s moderators. “I should add that outside agitators occasionally post awful threats etc in violation of our TOS, a phenomenon known as ‘fedposting’, he says. “We happily provide law-breakers‘ data to law enforcement when subpoenaed, so if abusing our site is your idea of a fun time you should think twice.”

Unlike Parler, Gab no longer depends on a single tech company for its server support. Instead it moved to a decentralised server arrangement after being rejected by server companies.

Gab uses a forked version of the Mastodon open-source decentralised social network platform, and decentralised moderation to improve its response. Moderation is now performed by thousands of users.

Despite these moves Gab is still seen as a haven for alt-right causes and criminal activity, and has been subject to multiple bans. Gab has welcomed groups such as QAnon, and was reported as the site where alleged Pittsburgh synagogue shooter Robert Bowers posted anti-Semitic and Holocaust-denying messages before allegedly slaughtering 11 people.

With this history, Gab faces headwinds to survive in the current political climate, with Apple and Google previously banning its apps, and Visa and PayPal among organisations black-listing it.

Yet millions of Trump’s former Twitter followers will be seeking to go somewhere else now that Parler too is derailed. They are social media refugees looking for a new promised land.

11:30am: Facebook banning ‘stop the steal’

Facebook said it is removing all content mentioning “stop the steal, ” a phrase popular among supporters of President Trump’s unproven claims of election fraud, as part of a raft of measures to stem misinformation and incitements to violence on its platform ahead of President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration.

The social-media giant said Monday that it would uphold its decision last week to suspend Mr Trump from posting for at least two weeks, with Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg saying at the time that the risks of the president using Facebook during this period were too great. The company also said Monday that it would continue to pause all US ads about politics or elections, including those from Mr. Trump.

“With continued attempts to organise events against the outcome of the U.S. presidential election that can lead to violence, and use of the [‘stop the steal’] term by those involved in Wednesday’s violence in DC, we’re taking this additional step in the lead up to the inauguration,” Facebook said in a blog post.

“It may take some time to scale up our enforcement of this new step but we have already removed a significant number of posts.”

Dow Jones

David Swan 9.30am: Twitter tumbles on Trump ban

Shares in social media network Twitter fell by more as much as 12 per cent on Monday, on renewed fears of fresh regulation after the company decided to unilaterally ban Donald Trump from its platform.

Politicians in both the US and Australia have expressed concern over the San Francisco company’s move to ban Trump, who had 88 million Twitter followers. Twitter had cited a risk of further violence for the ban.

The President issued a statement that was quickly removed on the @POTUS Twitter account, “I predicted this would happen. We have been negotiating with various other sites, and will have a big announcement soon, while we also look at the possibilities of building out our own platform in the near future. We will not be SILENCED!”

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said on Monday he was ‘uncomfortable’ with the Twitter ban, while Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chair Rod Sims suggested his regulator might need new powers, given the social media companies are seemingly making their own rules up on the fly.

The ban has also sparked calls for Congress to better regulate Twitter and Facebook, given they allowed last week’s rioters to organise using their platforms.

President Trump has called for a repeal of Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which says “interactive computer services” can’t be treated as the publisher or speaker of third-party content. It’s a law that effectively shields the social media giants from being sued for their content on their platforms.

Twitter shares closed 6.4 per cent to $US48.18, while Facebook fell 4 per cent to $US256.84. YouTube’s parent company Alphabet, which also deplatformed the President, fell 2.3 per cent to $US1,756.29.

David Swan 9am: Altium revenue down, keeps guidance

Altium said unaudited 1H revenue fell by 3pc to $US89.6 million on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, but has maintained full-year guidance amid what it said were signs of positive momentum.

The printed circuit board software firm said revenue in the Americas fell 10pc, while revenue from China declined 15pc amid uncertain post-coronavirus economic conditions.

Nonetheless, Altium Chief Executive Aram Mirkazemi said he was confident that momentum from 2Q will continue into the second half.

Altium in November flagged FY revenue of $US200 million-$U$212 million. It said Tuesday it maintained guidance adjusted for the sale of its non-core Tasking business.

Altium is scheduled to release its audited 1H results in February.

Dow Jones Newswires

Altium chief executive Aram Mirkazemi