Try to imagine a dictatorial president Trump getting both Facebook and Twitter shut down in the dead of night.
That’s what has happened to the social media service Parler, a right-wing site/app that was growing astronomically in the wake of the Jan. 6 Washington D.C. protest, reports Dailymail.com.
In fact, on Jan. 8, it was the most-downloaded app in the Apple Store.
Parler disappeared from the web and vanished from the Apple and Google app stores after tech giants deplatformed it in the wake of the demonstration that saw Americans enter the U.S. Capitol. It went offline shortly after 3 a.m. EST on Jan. 11 after Amazon booted it off its web hosting service, shutting it down until it can find a new hosting service.
Hailed by Donald Trump backers as a conservative-friendly alternative to Twitter – which permanently banned the president on Friday – the site was a gathering place for conservative activists and was accused by Apple, Google and Amazon of continuing to allow messages inciting violence after Jan. 6.
CEO John Matze warned in his final post before the 3 a.m. shutdown that “we will likely be down longer than expected” as tech firms distance themselves from the free-speech site.
“Amazon’s, Google’s and Apple’s statements to the press about dropping our access has caused most of our other vendors to drop their support for us as well,” said Matze, who called the coordinated assault by Big Tech “absolutely disgusting.”
