Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Social Media Alternatives for Conservatives
So this may be a topic that is already addressed somewhere on Ricochet, but I am new here and still trying to find my way around. I found Ricochet while searching for social media platforms for conservatives. I’m shocked by the lack of alternatives given the hostile treatment we get on platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
Is it that difficult to collect resources and technological expertise for a platform to upload videos (serious question, not rhetorical)? If anyone is aware of good alternatives please list them in a comment. As I am aware:
- Ricochet is a close match to a social media platform
- CRTV is doing a good job providing media content, but it does not allow general users to upload content
- Gab.ai is a Twitter alternative
- Others???
Given the current social media environment for conservative ideas, creating alternatives to the leftist giants should be a top priority for conservative/libertarian movers and shakers. If our voices cannot be heard then our ideas cannot be shared. If our ideas cannot be shared then we will lose the next generation of Americans and with them our liberties.
Published in General
I think the challenge is that Facebook, Twitter, et al; are what everyone uses. Sure, you can set up alternative sites, but the draw of the established social medium sites is that everyone else is there. Whether you’re looking for your relatives, high school friends, customers for your business – they’re not on the new, upstart, conservative site. They’re on the anti-American sites.
I am not on any of those so I think not everyone is on them. In fact as far as I am concerned no one is on them. How is that for logic?
There are various open source platforms for running your own social network.
The most well-known is Diaspora:
https://diasporafoundation.org/
Another one is Friendica:
https://friendi.ca
Others are profiled here:
http://www.worldwebtechnology.com/top-10-open-source-social-network-development-platforms/
My growing belief is that the business model is anathema to conservatives. All use a similar business model of data collecting to sell to some third party. I don’t think conservative entrepreneurs are ethically aligned to that type of business.
As to alternatives?
Bitchute for video – I haven’t been on their pc site, only mobile. From what I have seen, there is no search function, so you need another way of publishing your channel. Once subscribed, users have easy access to your library.
Minds.com – it looks nicer than gab.ai, but it’s more a Facebook replacer.
A writer at The Federalist thinks we should consider returning to blogging. http://thefederalist.com/2018/03/19/social-media-mistake-heres-experiment-find/
Welcome @ryankasak to Ricochet. Another conservative and informative website is <theconservativetreehouse.com/> However, sundance does the posting, you do the reading. You can make comments.
I no longer use the more public platforms as they are really intolerant. Pretty bad when Pamela Geller is banned from facebook but the muslim brotherhood is tolerated.
There is a Facebook-type platform for conservatives called Codias that I joined a while back but really haven’t done much with. Might be worth checking out, though.
Not sure if serious.
I’m not on Facebook or Twitter (yet), and I don’t post anything to YouTube; but that’s where “everybody” is.
Oh, and FullThirty.com is a gun-related site meant to be an alternative to YouTube.
Today is a not serious day. We are sitting around waiting for a tornado to hit here in Charleston. Needed something to worry about so posted comment.
Either you have a typo in your title or you’re from New England, then its pronounced right – you are in good shape here for interesting posts.
Thanks!
The sites don’t have to be exclusively for conservatives, just an option that won’t censor our viewpoints. The way I see it, conservatives make up roughly 50% of the user base on Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. If we all took our business elsewhere we would develop a platform that competes with these sites (in time) and puts pressure on those sites to be more inclusive. Even if only 20 percent of the user base abandoned them, that is a lot of business to lose out on. It is about creating pressure to change the existing platforms as much as it is to create a viable alternative.
It could be done I think, and likely marketed in such a way that points out that it doesn’t choose sides. Something like that would need some deep pockets though, because it would take a few years to gain any traction.
Well said. Whatever the alternative site/app is, conservative/non-partisan/etc, the hard part is getting people to switch to a social site with fewer opportunities for socializing.
This is an interesting take. I hadn’t considered this before but there could certainly be some truth to this.
You mentioned Ricochet, and I’m curious to know if the PTB now see Ricochet, in the present environment, as more expandable to something approximating a (larger than it is) social media platform. There seems to be an opening.
I have been on Gab.ai (under another ident) since just after it opened. It is (alas) a cesspit of racism and anti-Semitism. Its saving grace is a Mute feature which, if used constantly and ruthlessly, can make the experience worthwhile.
Yes. That is my observation with the limited exposure I have to Gab.ai. That is too bad. However, that is the price of an open forum. The only way to ethically counter that is to increase the number of users so as to “water down” the influence of those in that hateful minority. Good point, as conservatives/libertarians we have to be extra careful whom we are found on the same platform with. I can just see the leftist twists on such “associations” now.
Ah, no. Not even close.
Conservatives don’t even make up 50% of the United States. And the user base of all of those websites includes the entire world, even the parts where they don’t speak English as a first language. Given that “conservative” as most people here on Ricochet mean it is an exclusively American concept, vastly less than 50% of the users of those websites are conservative.
Doesn’t accept signups from outside the USA.
Dumb.
If conservatives don’t make up roughly 50% of the United States how do you account for various electoral results supporting conservative candidates? Are leftists being generous? Even if voters don’t identify as “conservative” or “libertarian” I believe many non-leftists would support a more open platform (including liberals who are not leftists – as differentiated by the likes of Dennis Prager).
Regarding the non-U.S. users of social media, I would agree that the people of other nations do not define conservatism the same way we do in America. However, there are strong contingents of people in most first world nations that support some alternative to the worldwide virus of leftism. Enough to sustain a social media platform, I don’t know. You may have a point there.
Regardless of whether various countries have significant populations of “conservatives” In this day and age, I would argue that nearly all countries have a portion of the population whose voices are being suppressed by leftists. The tactic of censorship is not a feature unique to the American Left. Statist, authoritarian fascists of all stripes use social pressure and censorship as a tool to keep populations under control. This worldwide issue is discussed by Flemming Rose in his book “Tyranny of Silence” (See discussion here: https://www.cato.org/events/tyranny-silence). Point being, while “American Conservatism” may be unique, leftist authoritarianism is not.
Nope. There are dozens of small pornographic websites that do just that hosted all around the world on a shoestring budget.
The problems are twofold:
The first problem is whether such a platform is profitable. There are many people who can build such a platform, who are available to work if you can pay on the order of thousands of dollars per day during the initial development phase. The problem is that the business models most people want to adopt do not generate thousands of dollars per day unless you are already Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, or have something that those companies will not touch that people want, e.g. porn (and even then, porn is no where at all close to those three in terms of revenue).
The second problem is that any social network is only useful to users if other people are already using it. Facebook is useful because “everybody” is on it. Twitter is useful because you can find any number of niches on it that are used by useful people. Serving a niche that isn’t already served by one of these two requires the ability to offer something else that those places don’t offer. Ricochet isn’t “Facebook for Conservatives”, it’s the home of civil conversation for the center-right. Coming up with a “something else” that people want is a hard problem that requires entrepreneurship.
Another issue is we don’t have “business”. Facebook and Twitter are free sites, paid for by advertising. Both Facebook and Google (YouTube) make zillions of dollars on the advertising that they “serve” you every minute you are on their sites, and they sell their analytics to advertisers to make more money off you. You are the product of those sites, and you are bought and sold continuously. Ricochet is a paid site, so the advertising, while there, is less intrusive on your experience.
I am not on Facebook or Twitter either, and every time I get a newsletter from Kim Komando detailing the latest Facebook scam, I am happier that I made the correct decision. Yes, it is possible to lead a life without Facebook. My friends who want to stay in touch can get to me via email, or via my personal blog over at RushBabe49.com.
Welcome to Ricochet-I think you will like it here. We don’t get spammed, or scammed, or any of that awful stuff that makes Facebook a jungle.
Great comment. Playing Devil’s Advocate, If a mass of conservatives and others wanting open uncensored exchanges would that not open the door for some critical mass?
Second, didn’t Facebook, Twitter, Youtube start with zero users at some point?
Third, and most importantly, the “something else” that I believe would appeal to many, many people would be supporting a platform that doesn’t censor their views or the views of others they may agree with (or disagree with but believe should be freely dialogued).
Fourth, I recall the beginning days of Facebook. It was an invite-only system that you had to be invited to by someone who was already a member. In those days the number of users was relatively small and only really expanded when they opened it to the general public. This seems like a great model. You start with a highly public opening to some of the big names of the “Right” allow them to trickle down users by inviting people in their immediate circle, those will expand the web, and then the next layer, and then the next, etc. The right needs to start looking at these issues more as a necessity
So it appears that a firearms-related YouTube channel has decided to start hosting their videos on a – wait for it – porn site.
So, um, I guess that is one approach to the situation. I guess.
Well, everyone used to be on MySpace. If someone started a better mousetrap that was free speech friendly I think people would flock there. I find Facebook less and less appealing even for keeping in touch with relatives and acquantances. And Twitter could DIAF and I wouldn’t miss it one bit.
Facebook started as a college kids only site. You needed a .edu email to sign up. In fact that was a big draw for the kids. No grownups looking over their shoulders…
Are that many people actually censored by Facebook/Twitter/YouTube, though? I know about some of the cases, but how many people even know about these problems? You’re not going to have many people flocking to the new site, unless the problem’s pretty widespread.
Caveat: I’m not on those platforms, so maybe it’s worse than I think.
There are a lot that post political stuff without being part of this culture that are aware. Both my father and uncle have had posts removed and they let their friends know.
I know several others that are aware – Dave Rubin interviewees and all followers (Who are from the left), alt-right (nationalists, not just the Spencer-types), a cross section of gamers, and libertarians. Pretty certain the only ones not aware are the Ctrl-Left.
The censoring of the Babylon Bee may have grabbed a lot of Christian attention.
OK. Perhaps it’s more wide-spread than I was thinking.
I was an early-adaptor to Friendster and Livejournal before even Myspace existed, and expected the idea of “walled gardens” to collapse as standards like OpenID took form. OpenID- and even Facebook Connect- take care of the network effect, the first hurdle in establishing a thriving “Web 2.0” site. If you use an authentication standard everyone already has an account for, it’s so much easier for people to migrate away from Big Social Media.
I expected social media to become as open as email. Maybe I was just premature. Perhaps we just needed people to experience misbehavior by the big companies. Before, talk of how they would behave was abstract. Now, not so much.
A competitor will need a thoroughly pleasant experience if people are going to stay migrated. The previously-mentioned Livejournal engine (it is free and open source) is still pretty enjoyable, but hardly the only one.