“I wanted to send an update to everyone at Parler.

We will probably be down for a longer period ", writes John Matze, the company's CEO.

An hour or so later, you were only met by an error message when trying to use the website or app.

After Parler's role in the Capitol Storm came to light, the app was quickly removed from Google and Apple's app store.

Amazon then announced that it will ban the company from using their servers, which has led to Parler now being shut down.

Photo: Facsimile

Criticism: "A coordinated attack"

John Matze has criticized the tech giants for "telling people what apps they can and should not use", and has called the shutdown "a coordinated attack by the tech giants to kill all competition", and "completely remove freedom of expression from the internet" .

Users are moving to niche platforms

Several of the big tech companies have worked through years of criticism of their handling - or rather lack of handling - of hatred and incitement to violence that takes place on their platforms.

At times, various phenomena and groups, such as QAnon supporters and Proud Boys, have been banned from several of the major social media platforms.

Many of them have then moved to smaller, more niche platforms, whose business ideas are based on "uncensored freedom of expression".

Parler is one of them.

And it's not the first alternative social network banned by tech giants.

"Gab" is also banned

Another platform that has attracted attention in connection with the storm is Gab, which was landed in 2017 by Andrew Torba.

It was intended as a counterweight to the giants Twitter and Facebook, which Torba considered rewarded a left-wing worldview, and censored right-wing voices.

After a perpetrator shot dead eleven people in a synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018, it emerged that before the act he posted an anti-Semitic message on Gab, something that SVT Nyheter reported about then.

This led to Paypal banning Gab.

At that point, the app was no longer welcome at Google or Apple.

The future of Parler

"We will do our best to move to a new supplier," said John Matze, according to CNN.

It was unclear on Monday when, and how, Parler will be online again.