The Disturbing Business Decision Kanye West Just Made
After being banned from Twitter for repeatedly posting anti-Semintic comments Kanye West announced his purchase of the ultra-conservative right-wing social media platform Parler.
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Parler, the controversial right-wing social media platform, is being purchased by Kanye West. The company announced the acquisition in a press release, saying it entered into an agreement with the rapper in principle that’s expected to close during the fourth quarter of 2022. The platform, which dubs itself as a free speech alternative to mainstream sites, recently resurfaced after being removed from various app stores for allowing posts that seek to incite violence in the country.
The Parler deal comes after Kanye West was locked out of his Twitter and Instagram accounts for making several Anti-Semitic comments. This included playing into a long-standing conspiracy theory involving Sean “Diddy” Combs, and saying that he would go “Death Con 3 on Jewish People,” CNBC reports. He also recently alienated fans and business partners by wearing a provocative White Lives Matter t-shirt at Paris Fashion Week.
While the singer’s representatives didn’t respond to a request for comment, the musician told Bloomberg News that he was motivated to buy Parler after Instagram and Twitter penalized him. “In a world where conservative opinions are considered to be controversial we have to make sure we have the right to freely express ourselves,” Kanye West explained. Although the financial terms of the deal weren’t revealed, the company previously raised $56 million in funding from investors.
Speaking about the acquisition, Chief Executive of Parler’s parent company George Farmer, said the deal will change the world, and change the way the world thinks about free speech. “Ye is making a groundbreaking move into the free speech media space and will never have to fear being removed from social media again.” He added that Kanye West is one step ahead of the legacy media narrative and Parlement Technologies will be honored to help him achieve his goals.
Addressing the “Parler Family,” Farmer said the current staff will still be working on the app to provide ongoing technical support. The platform also will continue to utilize Dynascale’s cloud services. Despite its popularity in some circles, the controversial social media site has struggled to remain relevant. After an explosion in growth following the 2020 U.S elections, the app only managed 90,000 global downloads times last month compared to nine million downloads for Twitter, according to Sensor Tower.
The Parler deal is the just latest in a series of moves by right-leaning people who want to create an alternative social media universe for free-speech proponents. Elon Musk has been in a prolonged back-and-forth to potentially buy Twitter, partly so he could loosen its moderation controls. In June he told the company’s employees that people should be allowed to say pretty outrageous things on the platform as long as it’s within the law.
Former President Donald Trump, who was permanently banned from Twitter in the wake of the U.S. Capitol riot, launched his own social network called Truth Social in February, The Wall Street Journal reports. And video platform Rumble said it was expecting investments from a group of prominent conservative venture capitalists. It will be interesting to see if Kanye West’s acquisition of Parler boosts the site’s popularity, or hinders its growth.
