It has been amusing to watch, from a safe distance, the progressive stasi and the neoboomers clash over control of information flow on the web. It has almost always ended with the Qoomers getting kicked to the curb as institutions pick their favorite side. One would think that they would examine the situation and conclude that it is time to build their own infrastructure with blackjack and hookers. But instead they consistently run back into the arms of their abuser like a desperate lover.
Take, for instance, Parler when their choice to run with AWS lead to lots of bawwing when Amazon predictably suspended their web hosting on political grounds. They also had mobile applications pulled from walled garden Goolag Play and AppHell App stores. And, like any good subordinate, they went and submitted to all the demands necessary to get back into the controlled thought box. The same thing happened to Gab when their phone drone application was removed, even by F-Droid (How’s that “free” software repository working you for ya?). These moves prompted their founder to go off on a tirade:
Come Monday, it’s on with Apple. We are done playing games with their double standards. It’s about to rain free speech.
As though it were possible to bully supranational technocrats into accommodating you on their own turf. Like the others, Gab got in bed with big tech to earn a place eating table scraps. You can never truly be free as long as your adversary continues to also be your landlord. And why are they still using platforms capable of dictating what you can and cannot install?
Alt media, particularly those on the right, decry censorship while at the same time salivating at the prospect of being “reinstated” on tyrannical platforms. And when they return to the cell block, they make sure to self censor so as not to anger their masters again. They can be found using infantalising code words and outright stating “We can’t talk about that”. And yet being allowed back is cause for celebration? Even being unpersoned does not seem to motivate these people to setup their own online spaces.
And the safe havens they pick can hardly be called champions of freedom.
| Alt Video Host | Brighteon | Rumble | Bitchute | BrandNewTube | Odyssee |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Censors content | Effectively | Effectively | Yes | Yes | Effectively |
| Uses Cuckflare | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Requires javascript | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Centralized | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Effectively |
| Big tech 3rd party resources | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Often the platforms they deem as saviors will even turn against their own kind the moment anything “offensive” arises on a “free speech” platform like Gettr. AuthRight pleaser Truth Social has also demonstrated such double standards. How many times are Alt/Lib-Right going to need to experience getting bitch slapped before they realize that the only way to self sovereignty on the web is through self hosting, decentralization and libre technologies?