Truth Social app to fail, but boost Trump presidential run - blog

Donald Trump's "Truth Social", a social network planned by the businessman seemingly just to replace the role of Twitter for him after he was kicked off the platform, is likely to fail. However, it could still boost him during a bid to be elected president again in 2024.

This is the view expressed at the relatively new blog Lordre, which took over a space used to display announcements relating to the small internet dissident group Mont Order until late last year.

Elaborating on this view, the blog asserts:

Truth Social will probably be a failure, especially if it is solely for political benefit and not as an actual social network with unique selling points and adequate moderation. If it is going to actually try to compete with Twitter and accommodate hard line conservatives kicked from Twitter, it will fail, but it could still have a positive effect on a hypothetical future Trump campaign. Whether that boosting effect on Trump's attempt to get re-elected will be decisive enough to return him to the White House remains to be seen.

What might boost Trump is the expected immediate censorship of his social network, with it likely to be denied a place on the Apple App Store. Large tech companies have been almost universal in their condemnation of Trump and his supporters, which will likely translate to them not giving his app any chance and forcing his supporters to log into the website instead.

Censorship of Trump would likely be ineffective and backfire in this case, as everyone would still be able to read the content easily and be more keen to see it (the Streisand Effect). The censorship would only boost Trump's case against Democrats and "Big Tech" suppression of his supporters.

The Lordre blog also expressed regret about supposed alternative social networks failing to offer much to users, especially focusing on Gab, saying "The best analogy is that if Twitter is a park, Gab is a lunatic asylum where the inmates are able to leave their cells and do whatever they want."

The blog dismissed Gab users as mostly being neo-Nazis, an extremely narrow and bizarre section of American society that promotes intimidation and undermines freedom of speech.

- ClubOfInfo

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Is Twitter losing a fight with the state?

 

Social networks are fighting a lost battle against states, the new online column Lordre has argued.

A detailed post at the new blog sided with Russian President Vladimir Putin's assessment that social networking websites sought to usurp some state responsibilities and that their attempts were "fleeting".

Going into more detail than Putin, the Lordre blog identified safety and access to information as key areas of responsibility that social networks seek to replace government in managing.

States are aware of the threat of monopolization of information and culture and are pushing back. To quote the blog, "The European Union currently has the Digital Markets Act (DMA) on the cards, which apparently will prevent a tech company from trapping users in an operating system or bundle of apps that solely favours its own services (and by extension news feeds) over any other firm's."

More severe confrontation exists with states in Africa. The blog argued, "Social media companies are uniquely confrontational towards governments, lately seeing themselves as authorities on par with some governments."

The deletion of government communications deemed to be violent (even if the government is at war) represent "an ineffective and failed usurpation of the state's responsibilities, since a state can still commit or allow violence whether Twitter deletes posts about it or not."

Despite their rebellious appearance, social networks are just "weak outfits", vulnerable to being "forcibly broken up due to laws, taken offline or bankrupted by fines at any moment the state truly loses patience with them."

The new Lordre blog has taken over the website lordre.net, formerly an unofficial Mont Order website.

- ClubOfInfo

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