A judge recently ruled that Facebook repeatedly and intentionally violated the State of Washington’s campaign-ad transparency laws and must pay penalties. Attorney General Bob Ferguson derided Facebook’s “cynical attempt” to gut the state’s campaign finance laws, challenging the Masters of the Universe to “follow the law.”
J.D. Vance, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate seat from Ohio, said on Monday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily with host Alex Marlow that Facebook co-founder and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s recent admission of his company’s digital censorship of news and information related to Hunter Biden’s laptop ahead of the 2020 presidential election contradicts the framing of Big Tech companies as operating within a free market.
Last Thursday, Zuckerberg told Joe Rogan on the latter’s eponymous podcast that the FBI advised his company of digitally circulated “Russian disinformation” in relation to news and information regarding the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop.
When asked about Big Tech censorship of reports on Hunter Biden’s laptop, Zuckerberg said, “The FBI, I think basically came to us — some folks on our team and was like, ‘Hey, um, just so you know, like, you should be on high alert. There was the — we thought that there was a lot of Russian propaganda in the 2016 election. We have it on notice that basically there’s about to be some kind of dump of — that’s similar to that. So just be vigilant.’”
The FBI’s role in Facebook’s digital censorship should have led to “wall-to-wall coverage for a couple of weeks,” Vance said, highlighting much of the news media’s refusal to report on the government’s coordination with technology companies’ political restrictions on access to information.
Vance alluded to governmental circumvention of the First Amendment by outsourcing its political censorship to ideologically aligned Big Tech firms.
He remarked, “I argue that Big Tech is too powerful and that conservatives need to wake up and realize what moment we’re in and actually go after these guys. The counterargument I always get is, ‘Well, they’re a private company, and of course we believe in free enterprise and we [believe] in capitalism.'”
“This a perfect illustration of why that argument is so inadequate,” he continued, “because these guys are not only censoring because the dictates of the market require them to. They’re sometimes censoring because the government shows up at their doorstep that says, ‘Do this, or else,’ and then they do it in a way that affects the presidential election.”
Marlow described the coordinated censorship between Big Tech and the FBI as “tantamount to election interference” given the potential impact that news and information about the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop could have had on voters’ decisions ahead of November 2020.
Vance remarked, “According to independent studies — some done by pro-Biden groups — millions of votes were changed because of the lack of coverage of the Hunter Biden story, because it implicates the entire Biden family in corruption, and it wasn’t covered. It wasn’t shared on social media n early the way it should have been, because our government told Mark Zuckerberg what to do with this digital media company.”
“It is an earth-shattering story,” he emphasized. “Unless we rein in the technology companies and unless we rein in the amount of power and influence they have over American elections, we’re never going to win the long-term battle.”
Free speech and expression are essential to a properly functioning American public capable of creating “better public policy” and making “better decisions,” Vance argued. Technology companies “backed up by the government agencies,” he concluded, “ are denying us” these essential freedoms.
Hunter Biden is the subject of a brand new narrative film My Son Hunter , marking Breitbart’s expansion into film distribution. It’s the story the establishment media don’t want you to see. It’s available for PRE-ORDER NOW at MySonHunter.com . The film becomes available for Streaming and Downloading September 7. The trailer has already been viewed over 3.5 million times across social media.
Bill Maher rips media over Hunter Biden cover-up
SO LONG HAS BRIBES SUCKER JOE BIDEN IS IN THE WHITE HOUSE THERE WILL NEVER BE ANY ANTI-TRUST ACTIONS AGAINST HIS TECH CRONIES!
NEO-FASCIST TECH BILLIONAIRES AND THE BIDEN REGIME… what do the tech billionaires get from protecting the Biden crime family?
https://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2022/08/sundar-pichai-of-googles-assault-on.html
Nor can we forget the role being played by the tech giants, who are using IT as a weapon for social control and the destruction of privacy.
4. Congress, he argues “is a joke.” Our government is run by “The cogs and lickspittles in the bureaucracy, led by a small elite in corporations, above all in Big Tech and finance, will determine all important policies, foreign and domestic.”
Big Tech vs Free Speech: Breitbart Exposed the Masters of the Universe in 2018 Townhall
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2019/05/05/flashback-breitbart-news-town-hall-exposed-the-silicon-valley-masters-of-the-universe/
Big Tech takes on Truth Social
It wasn't a matter of "if," but "when" and "how" big tech would target Donald Trump's social media platform, Truth Social.
Truth Social was recently barred from the Google Play Store, which is a digital distribution service for applications meant for Android phones.
Currently, there are more than 130 million Android smartphone users in the United States.
Axios reported the following statement from Alphabet , which owns Google.
On Aug. 19, we notified Truth Social of several violations of standard policies in their current app submission and reiterated that having effective systems for moderating user-generated content is a condition of our terms of service for any app to go live on Google Play.
Trump Media and Technology Group CEO Devin Nunes said the decision on whether the app would be available was "up to the Google Play Store." Nunes had previously called Google a "monopoly."
VIDEO
Google reiterated that Truth Social's violations, and the steps to redress them, have been clearly communicated with the company.
Trump Media pushed back, saying Truth Social was creating a "vibrant, family-friendly environment."
Google says it is up to Truth Social to comply with its rules.
The dispute continues.
Truth Social was founded as a free speech platform, following the coordinated social media ban on President Trump following the occurrences of January 6.
Upon its launch, Truth Social became the most downloaded application on the Apple Store.
Big Tech was always going to find a way to restrict Truth Social's reach.
Big Tech is vehemently opposed to people speaking their minds and effectively questioning the approved talking point from the establishment.
A perfect example is the Hunter Biden laptop story.
In October 2020, the New York Post had carried myriad reports on the shady lucrative business dealings of Hunter Biden , enabled by his father, Joe Biden, when he was vice president.
The laptop also contained photos of drug-addled Hunter in a compromising position with a prostitute. There were messages of Hunter using racist language and videos of him using drugs.
The stories showed Joe Biden as corrupt, nepotistic, and potentially compromised by hostile foreign countries.
During the 2016 presidential elections, Donald Trump and his supporters effectively used social media to counter the narrative of the establishment. The establishment characterized it as disinformation and hate speech.
During the 2020 presidential election, Big Tech didn't allow factual information to hurt the Democrats.
Twitter locked the New York Post's account. Facebook restricted the spread of the story. CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed he acted following a warning from the FBI about "misinformation."
This suppression of vital information was a blatant act of meddling in the 2020 presidential election.
A poll revealed that 16% of Biden voters said they would have voted differently had they known of Hunter's laptop.
So how did Big Tech grow into this monster that interferes in the elections with impunity?
They began like all providers by offering their applications such as Facebook and Twitter for free. People registered, and their reach and popularity grew.
Over the years, they built their ecosystem by eliminating or buying out all competition.
Old social media sites such as Orkut gradually faded away from public memory.
Competitors such as Instagram, the popular photo and video sharing social networking service, and WhatsApp, which is an instant messaging and voice-over-IP service, were acquired by Facebook Inc.
The growth was rapid and vast, such that these social media platforms have become official communication channels for governments worldwide.
In time, they had not just control, but a total monopoly, it was at this point they assumed the role of arbiter and controller of information.
If anyone questioned the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines, his message was either blocked, restricted, or labeled as unreliable. At times, the user was deplatformed for being a "serial violator."
However, if anyone overstated the efficacy of the vaccines, his message was promoted.
The world wide web was meant to be a platform that challenged the monopoly of the establishment. It was supposed to be a forum for rebels and dissenters.
It is most unfortunate that Big Tech engaged in total surrender to become allies with the establishment.
Back to Truth Social.
Truth Social is to Big Tech what Trump is to Washington, D.C.
Big Tech has built an ecosystem that comprises echo chambers. If Truth Social is allowed to exist, it blows a gaping hole in this ecosystem, and soon everything implodes.
Both Washington, D.C. and Big Tech realize that one dissenter can destroy their ecosystem, and hence they are going to use all their might to crush the rebellion.
This is merely the beginning of Truth Social's battles. There are a myriad.
Don't be too surprised if the Apple Store follows Google to challenge Truth Social for the violations of standard policies. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that they add clauses to their policies just to restrict Truth Social and block the app from iOS, which is Apple's mobile operating system.
But applications are not the only way that Truth Social can be accessed.
Truth Social can be accessed via the web. Here, too, Big Tech can play their games.
Big Tech can collude with various internet service providers to either restrict or reduce the download speed for Truth Social.
Browsers such as Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari and Microsoft's Edge can reduce the download speed of Truth Social.
This could result in it taking forever for Truth Social to load and users quitting in frustration.
Big Tech can also go after Truth Social's infrastructure.
Big Tech controls not just applications, but also the infrastructure such as servers that host the apps as well as the network infrastructure.
Truth Social wisely chose not to use Amazon servers. This may be the cause of a rocky phase initially, but it will be beneficial for Truth Social's longevity.
Parler, which promised free speech to its users, was banned from using Amazon's servers. This occurred when Trump was banned from social media, and there were rumors that Trump would join Parler.
In the future, Amazon will make attempts to buy out the firms that provide servers to Truth Social.
Let's look at personnel, a great deal of Truth Social's success will also depend on its staff who will both maintain the app and add new features as the app grows.
Big Tech could pledge never to employ any individual who worked for Truth Social. This policy may not be explicitly stated. But blacklisting a company means that it won't always attract the best talent.
When the GOP wins the House and the Senate following the midterms, confronting Big Tech must be a high priority.
They must ensure that Truth Social and other platforms that challenge the Big Tech monopoly are allowed to grow.
It is true that government must never interfere in the functioning of a free market. But when certain parties have a total monopoly over the market owing to the backing of a political party, the government has to intervene and level the playing field.
Image: Screen shot from Real America's Voice via YouTube .
Report: DOJ Prepares to File Antitrust Lawsuit Against Apple Pool/Getty 2:25
According to recent reports, the U.S. Department of Justice is in the early stages of drafting an antitrust lawsuit against Apple.
According to Politico , the U.S. Department of Justice is in the early stages of drafting an antitrust lawsuit against Apple. The report suggests that a potential lawsuit could arrive by the end of the year but also stresses that a final decision over whether or not to sue the company has yet to be made.
Apple’s Tim Cook (Noah Berger/AFP)
(Drew Angerer /Getty)
TechCrunch notes that in 2019, a deal was made between U.S. regulators that allowed the Justice Department to launch investigations of Apple and Google while the Federal Trade Commission would focus on other Big Tech investigations including Amazon and Facebook.
The DOJ has reportedly been investigating whether Apple abused its market power to dominate smaller tech companies, including hardware and software makers. Apple’s control over its App Store has long angered developers who wish to sell their apps directly to consumers without apple taking a 30 percent cut of all transactions. This issue became the subject of Fortnite developer Epic Games’ lawsuit against Apple which is currently under appeal.
The DOJ began reaching out to developers as early as 2020 in its examination of Apple’s business practices. The initial discussions included the makers of a parental control app that was pulled from the App Store for not complying with Apple’s rules. One developer said that their app was pulled from the store for six months, causing it to lose half its business.
The Bluetooth tracking device maker Tile has also accused Apple of engaging in unfair competition with the introduction of Apple’s AirTag. The Apple tracking device launched with direct access to the iPhone’s ultra-wideband technology for precision finding capabilities and integration into Apple’s “Find My” app. Tile argued that it shouldn’t have to sacrifice its direct relationship with its customers through its own app in order to compete with Apple’s hardware by becoming just another “Find My” partner. Tile further claimed that Apple’s decision to enter the market would all it to easily dominate due to its first-party advantage and ecosystem power.
WHO DO WE BLAME FOR JOE BIDEN? THE OTHER GAMER LAWYER BARACK OBAMA, OR BIDEN'S CRONIES IN HIGH TECH?
Big Tech and Big Law dominate Biden transition teams,
tempering progressive hopes
Alexander Nazaryan ad
Hauser also didn’t like the prevalence of Big Law talent on the Department of Justice team, which signaled to him that the Biden administration could go soft on corporate malefactors.
House Republicans have asked Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to hand over communications between his company and the FBI related to the platform’s suppression of the Hunter Biden “laptop from hell” story leading into the 2020 election.
The Hill reports that House Republicans on Thursday sent a request to Facebook (now known as Meta) CEO Mark Zuckerberg asking that he hand over communications between Facebook and the FBI in relation to the suppression of the New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story.
Mark Zuckerberg (Drew Angerer /Getty)
Hunter Biden photo from laptop. (Breitbart News)
Zuckerberg stated during his recent appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast that the social media platform limited the New York Post’s story across Facebook user news feeds before the 2020 presidential election. Zuckerberg claimed that the limiting o the spread of the story came in response to warnings from the FBI about disinformation and polarizing content.
35 Republican lawmakers said in a letter to Zuckerberg: “We have seen in recent months how some in government have sought to use Big Tech to censor divergent viewpoints and silence opposing political speech.”
The House Republicans added: “Facebook’s suppression of the Post article—and allegations of Biden family corruption highly relevant to the 2020 presidential election—following guidance from the FBI is highly troubling.”
The House Republicans claimed that the reduced distribution of the NYP article from Facebook prevented “Americans from fully understanding highly relevant allegations about President Biden’s awareness of and involvement in his family’s influence-peddling scheme.”
Facebook also suppressed stories about Zuckerberg’s appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience. Breitbart News senior tech reporter Allum Bokhari described the curious silence on the platform after its CEO appeared on the most popular podcast on the planet:
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s first appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience, the most-listened to podcast in the world, contained a number of bombshell revelations, foremost among them that the FBI was involved in the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Yet these news stories, which attracted massive attention on other platforms, gained surprisingly little traction on Facebook.
In the hours following the release of the interview, according to data from social media analytics service Newswhip, the story with the highest velocity on Facebook was a puff piece from Business Insider about Zuckerberg’s wife, Priscilla Chan — and even that got relatively little engagement compared to other, unrelated stories that were trending on the platform at the same time.
As Breitbart News previously reported, Zuckerberg confirmed in his interview that the FBI warned Facebook of an imminent “Russian propaganda dump” before the New York Post published its first stories on Hunter Biden’s “laptop from hell,” which were swiftly suppressed by Facebook and Twitter.
My Son Hunter , which marks Breitbart’s expansion into film distribution, was a crowdfunded project inspired by the investigative reporting of Peter Schweizer and Breitbart News about the Biden family’s corruption—reporting which the establishment media and Big Tech sought to censor during the 2020 election.
The film’s director Robert Davi described My Son Hunter
My Son Hunter pre-order now and will be available for download and streaming starting September 7—stars Laurence Fox (Victoria, Inspector Lewis, The Professor and the Madman ) as Hunter Biden; Gina Carano (The Mandalorian, Dead Pool, Heist ) as a Secret Service Agent; and John James (Dynasty ) as Joe Biden.
VIDEO
Read more at the Hill here.
The Biden administration and big tech allegedly colluded to suppress free speech during the pandemic with at least 88 separate communications, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt revealed Thursday.
Missouri and Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry in May filed a lawsuit that sought to “expose how top Biden Administration officials allegedly colluded with social media companies to censor freedom of speech on a number of topics, including COVID-19,” Schmitt’s announcement read. After Schmitt won the lawsuit in July, the Department of Justice (DOJ) was forced to reveal to the plaintiff in total 88 communications between the Biden administration and social media companies that show how the Biden administration and big tech worked together to “censor freedom of speech.”
“In response to Missouri and Louisiana’s interrogatories, defendants identified 45 federal officials at DHS, CISA, the CDC, NIAID, and the Office of the Surgeon General (all of which are contained in either DHS or HHS) that communicate with social media platforms about “misinformation” and censorship,” Schmitt wrote . “Beyond DOJ, Meta identified 32 additional federal officials including White House Officials who communicated with them, and YouTube identified 11 federal officials including White House Officials who communicated with them, many of whom were not disclosed by DOJ.”
Schmitt gave specific examples of how the Biden administration and big tech allegedly coordinated to suppress free speech on the platforms:
A senior FB official sent an email to the Surgeon General stating, “I know our teams met today to better understand the scope of what the White House expects from us on misinformation going forward.” This email chain follows the SG’s “misinformation health advisory” in July 2021.
The same senior official sent a later email to HHS and noted, “Thanks again for taking the time to meet earlier today.” Then, the official continued to discuss how Facebook is taking even more steps to censor freedom of speech.
Further communications show that Facebook is “increasing the strength of our demotions for COVID and vaccine-related content that third party fact checkers rate as ‘Partly False’ or ‘Missing Context.’
That content will now be demoted at the same strength that we demote any content on our platform rated ‘False.’”
Twitter scheduled a meeting to debrief top White House Officials on “vaccine misinformation.”
Schmitt also stated there were moments when Facebook would not want to comply with the administration’s alleged demands for censorship until the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) gave their input or debunked the claims the administration allegedly wanted suppressed. Schmitt even conveyed the CDC reportedly wanted to have monthly meetings to review posts on Facebook:
There are several instances where Facebook wouldn’t proceed with censoring freedom of speech on their platform until they had input, or a “debunking” from the CDC. Twitter followed the same course in at least one email.
The CDC also proposed a monthly debunking meeting with Facebook to help them censor free speech as well as regular “Be on the Lookout” calls with major social media outlets.
https://twitter.com/Eric_Schmitt/status/1565351527178711040?s=20&t=y6MJUCy1fumeYahbnNNvMQ
A White House official was even concerned about parody Fauci accounts and coordinated with Facebook to take them down.
https://twitter.com/Eric_Schmitt/status/1565351683290382337?s=20&t=y6MJUCy1fumeYahbnNNvMQ
Schmitt additionally revealed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency was communicating with big tech after DHS’ Disinformation Governance Board’s failed launch. The Treasury’s Deputy Secretary was also allegedly communicating with big tech to “ influence” its operations:
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) reached out to Twitter, Google, Meta, and Microsoft following the botched rollout of DHS’ Disinformation Governance Board:
The Deputy Secretary at Treasury sought to connect with social media platforms and influence operations on social media.
Upon the announcement of Schmitt’s findings, he promised more inflation would be revealed in a second effort to “compel the Department of Justice to turn over communications between high-ranking Biden Administration officials from the White House, Department of State, FBI and others and major social media companies.”
The case is State of Missouri and State of Louisiana v. Joseph R. Biden , No. 3:22-cv-01213 in District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.
J.D. Vance: Facebook-FBI Censorship Collusion Undermines ‘Free Enterprise’ Defense of Big Tech AP Photo/Jeff Dean 3:55
J.D. Vance, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate seat from Ohio, said on Monday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily with host Alex Marlow that Facebook co-founder and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s recent admission of his company’s digital censorship of news and information related to Hunter Biden’s laptop ahead of the 2020 presidential election contradicts the framing of Big Tech companies as operating within a free market.
Last Thursday, Zuckerberg told Joe Rogan on the latter’s eponymous podcast that the FBI advised his company of digitally circulated “Russian disinformation” in relation to news and information regarding the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop.
When asked about Big Tech censorship of reports on Hunter Biden’s laptop, Zuckerberg said, “The FBI, I think basically came to us — some folks on our team and was like, ‘Hey, um, just so you know, like, you should be on high alert. There was the — we thought that there was a lot of Russian propaganda in the 2016 election. We have it on notice that basically there’s about to be some kind of dump of — that’s similar to that. So just be vigilant.’”
The FBI’s role in Facebook’s digital censorship should have led to “wall-to-wall coverage for a couple of weeks,” Vance said, highlighting much of the news media’s refusal to report on the government’s coordination with technology companies’ political restrictions on access to information.
Vance alluded to governmental circumvention of the First Amendment by outsourcing its political censorship to ideologically aligned Big Tech firms.
He remarked, “I argue that Big Tech is too powerful and that conservatives need to wake up and realize what moment we’re in and actually go after these guys. The counterargument I always get is, ‘Well, they’re a private company, and of course we believe in free enterprise and we [believe] in capitalism.'”
“This a perfect illustration of why that argument is so inadequate,” he continued, “because these guys are not only censoring because the dictates of the market require them to. They’re sometimes censoring because the government shows up at their doorstep that says, ‘Do this, or else,’ and then they do it in a way that affects the presidential election.”
Marlow described the coordinated censorship between Big Tech and the FBI as “tantamount to election interference” given the potential impact that news and information about the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop could have had on voters’ decisions ahead of November 2020.
Vance remarked, “According to independent studies — some done by pro-Biden groups — millions of votes were changed because of the lack of coverage of the Hunter Biden story, because it implicates the entire Biden family in corruption, and it wasn’t covered. It wasn’t shared on social media n early the way it should have been, because our government told Mark Zuckerberg what to do with this digital media company.”
“It is an earth-shattering story,” he emphasized. “Unless we rein in the technology companies and unless we rein in the amount of power and influence they have over American elections, we’re never going to win the long-term battle.”
Free speech and expression are essential to a properly functioning American public capable of creating “better public policy” and making “better decisions,” Vance argued. Technology companies “backed up by the government agencies,” he concluded, “ are denying us” these essential freedoms.
Hunter Biden is the subject of a brand new narrative film My Son Hunter , marking Breitbart’s expansion into film distribution. It’s the story the establishment media don’t want you to see. It’s available for PRE-ORDER NOW at MySonHunter.com . The film becomes available for Streaming and Downloading September 7. The trailer has already been viewed over 3.5 million times across social media.
Bill Maher rips media over Hunter Biden cover-up
SO LONG HAS BRIBES SUCKER JOE BIDEN IS IN THE WHITE HOUSE THERE WILL NEVER BE ANY ANTI-TRUST ACTIONS AGAINST HIS TECH CRONIES!
NEO-FASCIST TECH BILLIONAIRES AND THE BIDEN REGIME… what do the tech billionaires get from protecting the Biden crime family?
https://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2022/08/sundar-pichai-of-googles-assault-on.html
Nor can we forget the role being played by the tech giants, who are using IT as a weapon for social control and the destruction of privacy.
4. Congress, he argues “is a joke.” Our government is run by “The cogs and lickspittles in the bureaucracy, led by a small elite in corporations, above all in Big Tech and finance, will determine all important policies, foreign and domestic.”
Big Tech vs Free Speech: Breitbart Exposed the Masters of the Universe in 2018 Townhall
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2019/05/05/flashback-breitbart-news-town-hall-exposed-the-silicon-valley-masters-of-the-universe/
Big Tech takes on Truth Social
It wasn't a matter of "if," but "when" and "how" big tech would target Donald Trump's social media platform, Truth Social.
Truth Social was recently barred from the Google Play Store, which is a digital distribution service for applications meant for Android phones.
Currently, there are more than 130 million Android smartphone users in the United States.
Axios reported the following statement from Alphabet , which owns Google.
On Aug. 19, we notified Truth Social of several violations of standard policies in their current app submission and reiterated that having effective systems for moderating user-generated content is a condition of our terms of service for any app to go live on Google Play.
Trump Media and Technology Group CEO Devin Nunes said the decision on whether the app would be available was "up to the Google Play Store." Nunes had previously called Google a "monopoly."
VIDEO
Google reiterated that Truth Social's violations, and the steps to redress them, have been clearly communicated with the company.
Trump Media pushed back, saying Truth Social was creating a "vibrant, family-friendly environment."
Google says it is up to Truth Social to comply with its rules.
The dispute continues.
Truth Social was founded as a free speech platform, following the coordinated social media ban on President Trump following the occurrences of January 6.
Upon its launch, Truth Social became the most downloaded application on the Apple Store.
Big Tech was always going to find a way to restrict Truth Social's reach.
Big Tech is vehemently opposed to people speaking their minds and effectively questioning the approved talking point from the establishment.
A perfect example is the Hunter Biden laptop story.
In October 2020, the New York Post had carried myriad reports on the shady lucrative business dealings of Hunter Biden , enabled by his father, Joe Biden, when he was vice president.
The laptop also contained photos of drug-addled Hunter in a compromising position with a prostitute. There were messages of Hunter using racist language and videos of him using drugs.
The stories showed Joe Biden as corrupt, nepotistic, and potentially compromised by hostile foreign countries.
During the 2016 presidential elections, Donald Trump and his supporters effectively used social media to counter the narrative of the establishment. The establishment characterized it as disinformation and hate speech.
During the 2020 presidential election, Big Tech didn't allow factual information to hurt the Democrats.
Twitter locked the New York Post's account. Facebook restricted the spread of the story. CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed he acted following a warning from the FBI about "misinformation."
This suppression of vital information was a blatant act of meddling in the 2020 presidential election.
A poll revealed that 16% of Biden voters said they would have voted differently had they known of Hunter's laptop.
So how did Big Tech grow into this monster that interferes in the elections with impunity?
They began like all providers by offering their applications such as Facebook and Twitter for free. People registered, and their reach and popularity grew.
Over the years, they built their ecosystem by eliminating or buying out all competition.
Old social media sites such as Orkut gradually faded away from public memory.
Competitors such as Instagram, the popular photo and video sharing social networking service, and WhatsApp, which is an instant messaging and voice-over-IP service, were acquired by Facebook Inc.
The growth was rapid and vast, such that these social media platforms have become official communication channels for governments worldwide.
In time, they had not just control, but a total monopoly, it was at this point they assumed the role of arbiter and controller of information.
If anyone questioned the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines, his message was either blocked, restricted, or labeled as unreliable. At times, the user was deplatformed for being a "serial violator."
However, if anyone overstated the efficacy of the vaccines, his message was promoted.
The world wide web was meant to be a platform that challenged the monopoly of the establishment. It was supposed to be a forum for rebels and dissenters.
It is most unfortunate that Big Tech engaged in total surrender to become allies with the establishment.
Back to Truth Social.
Truth Social is to Big Tech what Trump is to Washington, D.C.
Big Tech has built an ecosystem that comprises echo chambers. If Truth Social is allowed to exist, it blows a gaping hole in this ecosystem, and soon everything implodes.
Both Washington, D.C. and Big Tech realize that one dissenter can destroy their ecosystem, and hence they are going to use all their might to crush the rebellion.
This is merely the beginning of Truth Social's battles. There are a myriad.
Don't be too surprised if the Apple Store follows Google to challenge Truth Social for the violations of standard policies. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that they add clauses to their policies just to restrict Truth Social and block the app from iOS, which is Apple's mobile operating system.
But applications are not the only way that Truth Social can be accessed.
Truth Social can be accessed via the web. Here, too, Big Tech can play their games.
Big Tech can collude with various internet service providers to either restrict or reduce the download speed for Truth Social.
Browsers such as Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari and Microsoft's Edge can reduce the download speed of Truth Social.
This could result in it taking forever for Truth Social to load and users quitting in frustration.
Big Tech can also go after Truth Social's infrastructure.
Big Tech controls not just applications, but also the infrastructure such as servers that host the apps as well as the network infrastructure.
Truth Social wisely chose not to use Amazon servers. This may be the cause of a rocky phase initially, but it will be beneficial for Truth Social's longevity.
Parler, which promised free speech to its users, was banned from using Amazon's servers. This occurred when Trump was banned from social media, and there were rumors that Trump would join Parler.
In the future, Amazon will make attempts to buy out the firms that provide servers to Truth Social.
Let's look at personnel, a great deal of Truth Social's success will also depend on its staff who will both maintain the app and add new features as the app grows.
Big Tech could pledge never to employ any individual who worked for Truth Social. This policy may not be explicitly stated. But blacklisting a company means that it won't always attract the best talent.
When the GOP wins the House and the Senate following the midterms, confronting Big Tech must be a high priority.
They must ensure that Truth Social and other platforms that challenge the Big Tech monopoly are allowed to grow.
It is true that government must never interfere in the functioning of a free market. But when certain parties have a total monopoly over the market owing to the backing of a political party, the government has to intervene and level the playing field.
Image: Screen shot from Real America's Voice via YouTube .
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