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The Courts

Federal Judge Blocks Parler's Bid To Be Restored on Amazon Web Services (cnn.com) 214

A federal judge has denied Parler's request for a court order blocking Amazon from kicking the social media app off its platform, marking yet another setback in Parler's efforts to get back online. From a report: Judge Barbara Rothstein issued a ruling on Thursday saying that Parler had not met the legal requirements for a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction. That decision does not end the litigation, but it does mean that the court will not force Amazon Web Services to allow Parler back onto its cloud hosting platform. Amazon's move effectively kicked Parler off the public internet. Parler, the alternative social media platform favored by the far-right, had sued AWS earlier this month after AWS claimed Parler did not do enough to remove instances of incitement from its website.
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Federal Judge Blocks Parler's Bid To Be Restored on Amazon Web Services

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  • by FrankOVD ( 4965439 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @09:50AM (#60978172)
    I would not be surprised if they made a kind of "Built the wall" campaign to finance Parler's alt-right hosting services.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by cusco ( 717999 )

      Let Steve Bannon run it so that he can loot most of the money again, he should be out of jail soon with his new pardon

    • by ranton ( 36917 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:00AM (#60978246)

      I would not be surprised if they made a kind of "Built the wall" campaign to finance Parler's alt-right hosting services.

      A pardon for one crime doesn't protect you if you commit the crime again. It isn't a get out of jail free card for any future criminal activity.

      And in any case, Steve Bannon is probably the most likely individual to still spend significant time in prison for the same crime he was pardoned for. His criminal activity is not only a federal crime but also a crime in all 50 states. Considering the scope of his crimes he could potentially be charged in all 50 of them. Some officials, such as those in Florida, have already announced their investigations were still open and have suggested they may choose to file charges soon. New York also fixed a 'double jeopardy loophole' in 2019 which frees them to prosecute crimes which have been pardoned at the federal level. The future still doesn't look bright for Steve Bannon.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • Well he could do it legitimately.

          Could he, though? Is he physically, mentally, and emotionally capable of that?

          With Mercer backing, Parler doesn't need funds, it needs competent software developers and system administrators. The lack of both is why it's in this situation in the first place.

          Maybe it needs both, to weather the inevitable landslide of legal challenges that will result from multiple groups?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

        New York also fixed a 'double jeopardy loophole' in 2019 which frees them to prosecute crimes which have been pardoned at the federal level.

        Because NOTHING makes good law like the idea that "we HAVE to get these guys!" amirite?

        Fruit of the poison tree? Fuck that, we have parallel construction.
        Driving while black? Fuck that, he was swerving and I detected the odor of marijuana.
        Won't talk during interrogation? Fuck that, you have to speak up in order to preserve your right to remain silent, or we'll use your silence to infer your guilt.
        Jury didn't convict or federal pardon? Fuck that, let's prosecute again for the same crime in a different venu

        • by Mark of the North ( 19760 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @12:33PM (#60979068)

          No. You are wrong. That isn't what the 2019 move was. Your projection is showing.

          Trump was using the presidential pardon to protect people breaking the law for his own benefit. That is clearly not what the pardon was intended to do.

          Now, if a pardon is truly justified, states can choose not to pursue the case. Before, they simply could not. This is a move by state to limit presidential power, and the last month of month of news has shown it was a necessary one.

          • by fred911 ( 83970 )

            ''That is clearly not what the pardon was intended to do''

            Article II, Section 2 of the United States Constitution which states that the President "shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment".

            The only limitation is that of cases of impeachment. Insofar as the intent of the law, this should probably explain it best.
            https://www.scotusblog.com/202... [scotusblog.com]

            We still are a country of law, right. Isn't interpretation and application left with ou

        • Because NOTHING makes good law like the idea that "we HAVE to get these guys!" amirite?

          You realise that federal and state crimes are two different things and that just because you got lucky with your cronies in one system shouldn't prevent you from having a fair trial in another.

          But great false equivalency you got there comparing it to actual misuses of the legal system.

          Jury didn't convict or federal pardon? Fuck that, let's prosecute again for the same crime in a different venue.

          And thanks for showing the world you have no idea what you're talking about.

        • by tsqr ( 808554 )

          Jury didn't convict or federal pardon? Fuck that, let's prosecute again for the same crime in a different venue.

          People found not guilty at the state level are occasionally tried and convicted in Federal Court; just ask the cops involved in the Rodney King incident. Sounds like New York is playing turnabout.

    • by kot-begemot-uk ( 6104030 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @11:04AM (#60978612) Homepage

      I would not be surprised if they made a kind of "Built the wall" campaign to finance Parler's alt-right hosting services.

      They can't. At all. Not now. Not ever. Unless it is 1Bn in cash or more which nobody will give for that.

      Parler is an example of what happens if you have terminal AWS addiction. It was built for AWS cloud and it will not function on any other platform unless it provides most of AWS services.

      This is a lesson to anyone doing any application - you must not build your application to a single cloud and you should if possible use a private-public combo so that at least some of it is in-house and public cloud is used for scale-up/peak demand only.

      Parler never learned that lesson. It is too late to learn it now.

    • by teg ( 97890 )

      I would not be surprised if they made a kind of "Built the wall" campaign to finance Parler's alt-right hosting services.

      The wall that went from "Mexico will pay for it" to "Taxpayers will pay for it" to "Send Steve Bannon for money for it" to "Steve Bannon took your money" [bbc.com]?

  • Naturally (Score:5, Insightful)

    by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Friday January 22, 2021 @09:54AM (#60978200) Homepage Journal

    Parler, the alternative social media platform favored by the far-right, had sued AWS earlier this month after AWS claimed Parler did not do enough to remove instances of incitement from its website.

    They did nothing to remove "instances of incitement", but they do everything to remove accounts of people critical of Parler and/or conservatives and their views [marketrealist.com]. So we know they have the ability to police content, but instead they've used it to reduce free speech, on their platform where they fraudulently claim they preserve free speech. (It's textbook fraud because they require PII when you sign up, and that data is valuable.)

    Even if they hadn't been removing accounts for the "crimes" of liberalism and critical thinking, Amazon would still have been justified in kicking them off of AWS for clear and blatant violations of their terms of service. But their clear ability to moderate coupled with the fact that they spent more effort moderating things which didn't result in deaths than things which did is what's really going to keep them screwed in court. It puts the lie to any claims of a good faith effort to moderate.

    • Re:Naturally (Score:5, Informative)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:16AM (#60978328) Homepage Journal

      Have you read their complaint? https://beta.documentcloud.org... [documentcloud.org]

      It's obsessed with Twitter. Their defence is basically "but Twitter gets away with it and AWS hosts Twitter!" so Amazon must be being mean to them.

      For a start AWS doesn't host Twitter, it is only used to administer the "fleets" function.

      The real issue though is that failure to evenly enforce their ToS does not make Amazon a monopoly or guilty of Sherman Act antitrust violations (lol). So even if Amazon had treated Parler "unfairly" for political reasons, it wouldn't actually win them the case.

      An actual lawyer with more analysis here, but basically the whole thing is flawed and apparently written by someone who doesn't have the faintest idea how lawsuits work: https://youtu.be/FL7r-Nt5j50 [youtu.be]

      • The judge in the case also scolded Parler for not properly serving Amazon. Basically Parler could not get the basics of a lawsuit right.
        • I'm beginning to wonder if this is a deliberate strategy on the nutcases' part. File a intentionally badly flawed case and then when it immediately gets bounced for being badly flawed, they point to how fast it was dismissed and scream about how they couldn't get a fair hearing.

          • The lawyers would have to be involved. Errors like this are always on the lawyers and it follows them not the client.
          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            Their strategy is manufacturing outrage to whip their idiot supporters into a froth with end results like the Capitol riot, so yes.

            This derives entirely from the fact that said supporters are massive narcissists incapable of admitting they're wrong. If someone proves them wrong, they get mad either because they're too dumb to understand, or because they channel cognitive dissonance into impotent rage. If someone proves them right, of course, that's how the world works. You can't win against that level of st

      • It's obsessed with Twitter. Their defence is basically "but Twitter gets away with it and AWS hosts Twitter!" so Amazon must be being mean to them.

        It's hilarious when internet arguments meet real life. I think a lot of people are convinced they're winning internet arguments by shouting and crapflooding, not realizing that the eventual lack of replies is due to the opposition getting fed up rather than being unable to "rebut".

        Turns out this doesn't work on judges. And it's funny to see.

  • Who? Where? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Freischutz ( 4776131 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @09:56AM (#60978218)

    It remains unclear who may actually wind up providing the servers on which Parler's social network will run.

    I suppose they could try the Kremlin.

  • Why AWS? (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 22, 2021 @09:56AM (#60978226)

    Why waste good money on lawyers and courts? Just to fight some altruistic battle? Maybe it would set a good legal precedent, but the lawyers should have known they didn't have a strong enough case.

    Put the $ into building your own servers. Or find someone else to host, but don't waste $ on lawyers.

    • Making your own hosting service would be extremely expensive, often far much more on these legal suites.
      For a site, that is now a social pariah media. You are going to try to find a community willing to take a risk on building your data center, having to find a land owner willing to sell or rent to you. Heck I would be willing to say I have a religious objection to selling to Parlor if I were selling land.
      If you were to find a spot, I really doubt that governments will be bending over to give you a big tax

    • Their big shot to capture the exodus of the herd from twitter before it dissipates or goes elsewhere will only last literally a few days, so I can see why their preferred approach is "Just turn it back on!"
    • Why waste good money on lawyers and courts? Just to fight some altruistic battle? Maybe it would set a good legal precedent, but the lawyers should have known they didn't have a strong enough case.

      Put the $ into building your own servers. Or find someone else to host, but don't waste $ on lawyers.

      Once you start serving loads of BS it's hard not to eat at your own trough.

      The owners may have genuinely believed they had a good case, and once you're determined to go to trial you'll probably find a lawyer to accommodate you.

    • Maybe because it worked for Trump to make his fight against the election seem just in the eyes of his supporters, even though most of the cases were thrown out.
  • This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by JoeyRox ( 2711699 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:14AM (#60978320)
    Conservative Republican company loses bid to convince government body to force private industry into an agreement it doesn't want to be part of.
    • Re:This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Teresita ( 982888 ) <badinage1@@@netzero dot net> on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:41AM (#60978468) Homepage
      We're talking about people who live in Arizona who sue Pennsylvania for the way their Supreme Court ruled on counting mail-in ballots, federalism be damned. Trumpists make Hugo Chavez look like William F. Buckley Jr.
    • "Conservative Republican company loses bid to convince government body to force private industry into an agreement it doesn't want to be part of."

      It's not just forcing an agreement, but forcing that agreement before that government body has seen the reasons why it would or should not force that agreement.

      It's just the request for TRO or PI that has been turned down so far.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • That is not how the judge saw it. She ruled that based on the initial evidence that Parler breeched and Amazon had a right to terminate.
  • by The Evil Atheist ( 2484676 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:27AM (#60978414)
    Sincerely admit that regulations are good, and that net neutrality is good, and you can have Parler back.
  • by SchroedingersCat ( 583063 ) on Friday January 22, 2021 @10:46AM (#60978504)
    Parler made a rookie mistake and locked themselves in to a single vendor. AWS is not a reliable partner. There are many pitfalls in their TOS. Use open APIs and avoid vendor lock-ins next time.
    • Nah not really. AWS is not exactly a hard system to migrate away from. There are many AWS compatible providers. There's even AWS compatible private clouds if you want to migrate off AWS and just copy and paste it to your own metal boxes.

  • * Rent a load of servers under a one-person shell company, contract it out to Parler.
    * Rent some servers in Russia, China, you name it. So many nations giddy to show a finger to the US, and I' sure you can make up a Trumpette-logic reason how this represents your glorious winning over them.
    * Just use any other damn "cloud" provider. I'm sure one of them is desperate enough, doesn't care, or is just like you.

    Hell, why not just have the shell company rent Amazon's crap directly, and use that, without telling

  • The N*zis shut down the Berliner Tageblatt on January 31, 1939. Bezos and his ilk really need to take a long, hard look in the mirror.

    *And it looks like Slashdot's management needs to do the same.

  • twitter is already dead. something will come in its place. no one will go to twitter to get a lobotomized version google news. twitter was a mediocre copy of google+. unfortunately google+ died because it didn't have all the features which produce all the hatred on slashdot and on twitter. Any platform which doesn't allow editing of one's own posts becomes a magnet for jerks. The mud slinging is what kept twitter alive. No one is going to bother slinging mud at the people who are immune to it. That's
  • ...is that putting your company's infrastructure exclusively on some other company's hardware is a really bad business plan.

  • Now everyone who doesn't want to have the news about Hunter's laptop filtered is in the "far right"?

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