Overview
Parler is a microblogging and social networking service launched in August 2018 and headquartered in Henderson, Nevada, in the United States. It markets itself as a free-speech alternative to mainstream social networks, positioning itself against the content moderation practices of platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. The service is pronounced “PAR-ler.”
The platform describes its operating policy in terms of equality and neutrality. According to its own stated principles, Parler does not engage in what it calls “shadow-banning,” treats all users equally regardless of race, sex, age, sexual preference, religion, or dietary choice, welcomes both believers of any religion and non-believers to speak civically, and supports those who hold a neutral viewpoint and are willing to listen to any non-violent opinion. Its stated rationale is that biased content curation provokes user anger and undermines community guidelines.
Features and Specifications
As of November 29, 2020, Parler’s feature set included the following. User posts appear in reverse-chronological order. Posts support text, URLs, still images, and GIF images, while video can be embedded as a URL link. A single post is limited to 1,000 characters. Posts can be deleted but not edited after publication. An emoji input button is provided. Users can comment on posts. An “Echo” function allows a user to quote and re-post their own or another user’s post, optionally with added commentary. A “Vote” function permits upvoting and downvoting, with downvotes available only on comments. Each post displays a view count. A verification feature exists: verified users receive a red badge in the lower-right corner of their user icon. Verification requires presentation of a driver’s license or passport, though driver’s licenses are accepted only from the United States. The red badge indicates that the user is a real person, not a bot or program, and holds a unique account. When the language setting is changed to Japanese, some items and descriptions display incorrect translations.
Reception
Parler presents itself as a champion of free expression and is said to be popular primarily among conservatives. It has been described as a Twitter alternative and is said to be used by people who dislike fact-checking on mainstream social networks. Writing in Forbes, Enrique Dans argued that Parler’s terms of service were stricter than those of Twitter or Facebook, that it contained a large amount of hate speech, and that it functioned as an echo chamber.
App Store Removals and Hosting Suspension
On January 8, 2021, Google removed Parler from Google Play. Apple gave Parler’s official app a 24-hour grace period, demanding the removal of problematic content and stating that the app would be removed from the App Store otherwise. Google cited the presence of incitement to riot, and Apple cited the January 2021 storming of the United States Capitol in taking these measures.
Parler CEO John Matze responded that Parler’s rules against incitement to violence already in existence met Apple’s standards. He also stated that political groups were unfairly targeting Parler, saying, “They want to suppress free speech and their opposition.” To the BBC he said that he would not bow to politically motivated companies or authoritarians who dislike free speech.
In its reporting, Reuters noted that conservative social media users, citing Twitter’s and Facebook’s crackdowns on political expression, were also communicating on Gab and Telegram in addition to Parler. Robert Mercer, who had provided funding to Parler, said of Google’s and Apple’s actions: “If Parler has to be responsible for Parler’s user content, then Apple must be responsible for all illegal acts committed on the iPhone,” and “Rules that are not applied to Twitter, Facebook, and Apple itself are being applied to Parler.”
Amazon announced on January 10 that it would remove Parler from Amazon Web Services. The stated reason was that violent content had surged and that all of it constituted violations. In response, Parler founder and CEO John Matze criticized the move in a statement as “an attempt to completely eliminate free speech on the internet.” He also announced that the service could be unavailable for up to one week while Parler rebuilt.
On January 18, Parler entered a partnership with the Russian DDoS-Guard and partially returned. On February 15, 2021, Parler announced its restoration, with Mark Meckler of Tea Party Patriots taking over as interim CEO. The new server provider was SkySilk Cloud Services.
The January 2021 Delisting
Parler was removed from Google Play on January 8, 2021. Apple gave the app twenty-four hours. The reasons, as stated by the two companies, were incitement to riot and the storming of the United States Capitol that same month. Two app stores, one deadline, and a platform that had framed its entire existence around not being moderated the way the others were moderated — this was the week the argument was settled by infrastructure rather than by debate.
Parler CEO John Matze responded that Parler’s existing rules against incitement to violence already satisfied Apple’s standards. He said political groups were targeting Parler unfairly, and that those groups wanted to suppress free speech and their opposition. To the BBC, he said he would not bow to politically motivated companies or to authoritarians who dislike free speech. Reuters, reporting on the same period, noted that conservative social media users were communicating on Gab and Telegram as well as Parler, citing Twitter’s and Facebook’s handling of political expression as the reason. Robert Mercer, who had funded Parler, said that if Parler had to be responsible for its users’ content, then Apple had to be responsible for every illegal act committed on an iPhone, and that rules not applied to Twitter, Facebook, and Apple itself were being applied to Parler.
The Amazon Web Services Decision
Amazon announced on January 10 that it was removing Parler from Amazon Web Services. The company’s stated reason: a surge in violent content, all of it a violation. Matze’s response, in a statement, called it a complete attempt to eliminate free speech on the internet. He also said the service could be down for up to a week while Parler rebuilt. The platform went fully offline on January 10.
DDoS-Guard and the Return
On January 18, Parler entered a partnership with the Russian DDoS-Guard and came partially back. Then, on February 15, Parler announced its restoration. Mark Meckler of Tea Party Patriots took over as interim CEO. The new server provider was SkySilk Cloud Services. For a service that had been described as a Twitter alternative and had spent a week offline, the comeback was assembled from a Russian DDoS mitigation firm and a cloud host, with an interim chief executive borrowed from a political organization.
The Acquisition Agreement
On October 17, 2022, the operating company announced that it had agreed to be acquired by the rapper Kanye West. Parler, which had been founded in August 2018 and had built its identity on rejecting the moderation regimes of its larger rivals, entered the final stretch of this chapter as the subject of a purchase agreement. The details beyond the agreement itself were, by that point, not the story. The story was that a platform launched as a permanent alternative had, in under five years, been delisted by two app stores, dropped by its hosting provider, restored through a Russian partner and a new cloud host, and agreed to be sold.
1,000 Characters and a Red Badge
The specifics of Parler’s design carry their own small history. Posts were capped at 1,000 characters. They appeared in reverse-chronological order, not by algorithmic ranking. They could be deleted but never edited. Comments accepted downvotes; posts did not. Verification required a driver’s license or passport, and driver’s licenses were accepted only from the United States. A verified account received a red badge in the lower-right corner of its icon — a small red square certifying that the account belonged to a real person and not a bot. Set the language to Japanese, and some items and descriptions returned incorrect translations. These are the details that outlast the arguments: a character limit, a badge, a broken translation string.
The Terms of Service Argument
Writing in Forbes, Enrique Dans made a case that ran against the platform’s own marketing. Parler’s terms of service, he wrote, were stricter than Twitter’s or Facebook’s; hate speech was abundant; the result was an echo chamber. This was the counterintuitive turn in the Parler story — a service that advertised itself as the least moderated of the alternatives, described by a critic as the most tightly ruled and the most insulated. Both claims could be made about the same platform because the moderation question and the echo-chamber question were never the same question.
The Alternatives List
Parler did not arrive into empty space. It arrived into a category. The related services listed alongside it — Truth Social, Gab, Gettr, 8chan — form a set that readers of internet history will recognize as the recurring answer to a recurring demand: a place to go when the place you were in decides you have gone too far. Parler is one entry on the list of social networking services, and it is also one entry on a shorter, more argumentative list. Its own stated policy language — no shadow-banning, equal treatment regardless of race, sex, age, sexual preference, religion, or dietary choice, a welcome to believers of every religion and to non-believers, support for the neutral-minded who will listen to any non-violent opinion — reads now as a position statement in a debate that infrastructure companies ended by simply turning off the servers.
What the Offline Week Left Behind
For seven days in January 2021, Parler was not a platform. It was a domain that resolved to nothing. The lesson that the week impressed on the internet was not about speech at all; it was about hosting, app distribution, and the three or four companies that sit between any service and its users. Parler came back on February 15, 2021. It came back through a Russian DDoS mitigation provider and a new cloud host, with an interim CEO. Then, on October 17, 2022, the operating company announced it had agreed to be acquired by Kanye West. A platform that had been built to prove that deplatforming was impossible had, by then, been deplatformed, restored, and put up for sale. The character limit is still 1,000 characters. The posts still cannot be edited. The red badge still means a real person. Those things did not change, and in the end they are the part of Parler that stayed.