2). AWS can terminate an account immediately if they deem you in violation of their policies instead of a suspension - as was the case with Parler. It's all in the AWS customer agreement, which Parler agreed to.
The free speech / censorship argument doesn't seem to fly.
The Lin Wood post on Parler (https://twitter.com/slpng_giants/status/1347190280492089344) and dozens of other posts with screenshots on that thread are clearly targeted threats of political violence and have never constituted free speech:
> common limitations or boundaries to freedom of speech relate to libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets, food labeling, non-disclosure agreements, the right to privacy, dignity, the right to be forgotten, public security, and perjury
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech
Sedition, incitement and public security all seem to apply here to the content Parler was hoping to keep publicly accessible.
But as far as other platforms go, like Twitter, they made Kathy Griffen delete her direct threats against Trump: https://www.waynedupree.com/2020/05/kathy-griffin-twitter-pu...
So, I'm not sure they have enough examples of other platforms allowing this level of violent content to remain public for long.
I think given these events companies should reassess the risk of using these cloud services and the potential for disruption of their businesses going forward.
No one needs Facebook, Twitter, or Parler to survive.
Absolutely! If the horror stories of companies losing access to their accounts due to automated processes going haywire haven't convinced us that "cloud risk" is real, perhaps this incident with Parler will focus our minds to this possibility.
They make the case that Amazon is because they provide hosting for Parlers larger competitors.
Why AWS would help Twitter is unclear to me, though.
At least take the time to note the name of the company, before weighing in with your opinions.
[None of this confusion would arise, if you Yanks spelled 'Parlour' properly]
It just suggests the poster's examination of the subject in question has been pretty perfunctory and their opinion slightly less than well thought out.
[But congratulations on not being a Yank. That's something, at least]
I imagine the legal argument will be based on AWS providing the services & hosting for Twitter. Which would be a clear and fair argument.
> 4. AWS’s decision to effectively terminate Parler’s account is apparently motivated by political animus. It is also apparently designed to reduce competition in the microblogging services market to the benefit of Twitter. 5. Thus, AWS is violating Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act in combination with Defendant Twitter
> 15. Less than a month ago, AWS announced with a press release a new multi-year deal with Twitter. AWS will “provide global cloud infrastructure to deliver Twitter timelines.” Twitter Selects AWS as Strategic Provider to Serve Timelines, Press Center, Amazon, (Dec. 15, 2020), https://press.aboutamazon.com/news-releases/news-release-det....
They also claim no other cloud provider has accepted their business because AWS, by leaking its email to Parler to Buzzfeed (which showed lots of violence threats on Parler) before even sending it to Parler, had tarnished its reputation (i.e. it was trying to manipulate popular opinion by leaking the worst posts they found - and Parler claims the same content could be easily found on Twitter at the same time - I don't know as I don't see this shit in my stream but everyone has very different streams based on their preferences, so it's plausible I think).
This looks like a dirty game they're playing, and to be honest, it's hard to say for sure that AWS and Twitter are completely clean in this... AWS is probably betting Parler will get enough hate so that other customers who may have controversial businesses running on AWS will not consider moving elsewhere (or al least preparing to do so at short notice)... which to me, kind of shows that Parler may have a point in this argument... On the other hand, Parler had very disturbing content (I did manage to have a peek just before they went offline) which I think goes well beyond the acceptable level, but for AWS to "kill" them, as they claim AWS is trying to do, seems quite heavy handed.
They can consider themselves very lucky and capable if it can be done within a week, but I think it'll take longer.
> We may terminate this Agreement for any reason by providing you at least 30 days’ advance notice.
and
> Either party may terminate this Agreement for cause if the other party is in material breach of this Agreement and the material breach remains uncured for a period of 30 days from receipt of notice by the other party.
The latter obviosuly applies here. Am I missing something?
> 6.1 Generally. We may suspend your or any End User’s right to access or use any portion or all of the Service Offerings immediately upon notice to you if we determine:
> (a) your or an End User’s use of the Service Offerings (i) poses a security risk to the Service Offerings or any third party, (ii) could adversely impact our systems, the Service Offerings or the systems or Content of any other AWS customer, (iii) could subject us, our affiliates, or any third party to liability, or (iv) could be fraudulent;
> Disputes will be resolved by binding arbitration, rather than in court, except that you may assert claims in small claims court if your claims qualify. The Federal Arbitration Act and federal arbitration law apply to this Agreement.
I don't know, they do have some of the greatest hits from those lawsuits:
* Let's ask the court to prevent things that have already happened (it wants to restrain AWS from cutting off service to Parler, but it filed the suit after that happened).
* File exhibits that are atrociously unusable (the PDF of the service agreement clearly cuts out several lines of text, although I think this was unintentional).
* Provide a single paragraph of argument to address the single claim that actually gives your claim federal jurisdiction at all.
* Clearly incapable of reading contract plain text (in this case). The contract claims are likely to fail since AWS has a right to terminate it unilaterally (which they don't address in their filing all), but it's moot anyways because binding arbitration clause means the court has no right to hear it.
* Evidence for their claim boils down to "there's no other possible reason anyone would want to shut us down than CONSPIRACY!"
* Urgency is requested, but there's no motions to actually grant urgent relief (e.g., an emergency filing or motion for expedited relief).
* Plaintiff fails to spell its own name correctly in a few cases (admittedly, only one here).
I personally think it’s ridiculous to argue that the baker’s right to free expression is involved in this. But then again we have people boycott service providers for their choices of customers all the time.
There is all kinds of Untested legal claims about these click wrapped ToS "contracts" we all "sign" with out reading by clicking a check box on a sign up form.