Latest news with #Parler
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Iowa Tea Party founder Ryan Rhodes will run in 4th District congressional race
Republican Ryan Rhodes has launched a campaign for Congress in Iowa's 4th District, saying it's time to "drain and then set fire to the Washington swamp." 'This race isn't about left versus right — it's about two very different visions for the future of conservatism,'Rhodes said in a news release. 'We're no longer just talking about tax policy — we're fighting a spiritual and cultural war for the soul of our country. I will not shy away from those hard truths. I'll be a relentless voice for faith, family, freedom, and the forgotten men and women of the Heartland.' Rhodes said he's running on a platform of "no compromise" when it comes to protecting the Second Amendment, recognizing that an unborn fetus has "personhood" rights, defending the border and ending "corporate welfare." "California could have stayed in California. New York could have stayed in New York," he said in the release. "It's time to take the fight to them and MAKE AMERICA IOWA!" Rhodes, a 43-year-old Ames resident, served as the CEO of the conservative social media site Parler before stepping down earlier this year, although he said he still serves on the board. He also was the founder of the Tea Party in Iowa. In an interview, Rhodes said he thinks Republican President Donald Trump represents embodies the ideals he set out to champion with the Tea Party movement roughly a decade ago. "Somebody's finally getting in there, cutting government and trying to get us back on the right direction," Rhodes said. "And I know he has so much more he wants to continue doing, so each new piece of legislation is a new bite of the apple to get the government under control." Rhodes previously worked for Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson and helped conduct outreach for Michelle Bachmann during their GOP Iowa caucus campaigns. The 4th District seat is expected to be open in 2026 as current Republican U.S. Rep. Randy Feenstra moves aggressively toward a gubernatorial run. It is the most heavily Republican district in the state, and the GOP primary race will very likely determine who will be elected to Congress. It has already attracted three other Republican contenders: Siouxland Chamber of Commerce President Chris McGowan, Iowa House Majority Leader Matt Windschitl and Humboldt farmer Kyle Larsen. On the Democratic side, Ashley WolfTornabane and Stephanie Steiner have mounted campaigns. Brianne Pfannenstiel is the chief politics reporter for the Des Moines Register. Reach her at bpfann@ or 515-284-8244. Follow her on X at @brianneDMR. This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: 4th District Republican Ryan Rhodes will run for Congress in 2026
Hindustan Times
24-07-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
Who is George Farmer and what is his net worth? 5 facts on Candace Owens' husband
Candace Owens recently drew attention after French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife, Brigitte Macron, filed a defamation lawsuit against the American far-right to the court filings in the Delaware state court, the French couple alleged that Owens profited after spresding the rumors that French First Lady was born a biologiacal male, as reported by Politico. Candace Owens is married to George Farmer, a British entrepreneur with a significant net worth from various business ventures and real estate holdings.(@RealCandaceO/X) Owens is married to successful British entrepreneur and politician George Farmer. He is the founder of a global consulting company called Redfield & Wilton Strategies and Red Kite Group, which is copper market governance firm. He is also the CEO of Parler which isn now a defunct conservative social media app, as reported by Tuko. Also Read: Who is Candace Owens? Right-wing commentator sued by French President Macron for defamation 5 facts about George Farmer 1. George Farmer was born in London, United Kingdom, on 15 December 1989. 2. Farmer was to Lord Michael Farmer and Jennifer Potts. His father holds a life peerage in the House of Lords, the upper chamber of the United Kingdom's Parliament. Lord Michael has acquired a significant wealth from his career as a businessman and a politician. 3. As an entrepreneur, he has founded two companies, Redfield & Wilton Strategies and Red Kite Group, nad CEO of Parler. 4. Farmer's career as a politician includes his unsuccessful run in 2019 for the Brexit Party and participation in conservative political activities. He was also the chairman of Turning Point UK, which is the English spinoff of Turning Point USA, a right-wing group. 5. Farmer married Owens in August 2019, and the couple shares three children from their marriage-- 2 sons and a daughter. Owens' husband is 5 feet 11 inches or 180 centimeters tall. Also Read: Bryan Kohberger brutalized one Idaho victim more than the rest, chilling documents reveal What is George Farmer's net worth? As of late 2024, Farmer's net worth is alleged to be between $180 million and $240 million, as reported by Tuko. While most of his net worth's contributions come from his extended career as a politician and entrepreneur, his real estate also adds handsomely. Farmer owns a $19.5 million luxury mansion in London, along with ten additional estate properties across the United Kingdom, France, Morocco, and Belgium. Moreover, in 2020, he purchased a sprawling estate in Tennessee, where he now resides with his family. He earns an estimated $40 million annually from his real estate holdings and various business ventures.
The Hill
24-06-2025
- Business
- The Hill
How we are ending Iran's and all other governments' power to censor online
Increasingly centralized control over digital identity and online interactions has led to widespread censorship and ideological engineering, reinforcing a model that strips individuals of their autonomy in the digital world and allows governments to censor content and opinion in the name of national security. The current crisis over the intransigent radical Islamic regime in Tehran, hellbent on the development of nuclear weapons in the teeth of world opinion and Trump administration efforts to prevent it, highlights the need for new technology that can prevent heavy-handed efforts to suppress free speech and manipulate popular opinion. After the outbreak of hostilities with Israel and the beginnings of street demonstrations in Tehran in support of the Israeli effort to decapitate the lawless regime of the mullahs, the Iranian government almost immediately attempted to block all social media apps as protestors flooded the streets and attempted to organize messages and activity in opposition to the regime. The terrified government was able to block most communication via the traditional technology of shutting down access to the central hub, or internet server. But because the social media app Parler (in which I am a major investor) is now designed so that content and speech cannot be pulled offline — even if tech companies, banks, or governments want it taken down — it remained online and saw a massive surge in usage on the part of Iranians opposed to the government. Protestors are now organizing in every major Iranian city on Parler, because its innovative blockchain technology is designed to stop online censorship. Whether or not this spells the end of the mullahs' dictatorship, it spells the end of their lock on information. Parler learned its lesson about the need for a platform impervious to government censorship the hard way in January 2021, when Big Tech colluded with government to destroy its platform. Parler was forced offline after tech giant Amazon, under pressure from American intelligence agencies and other U.S. government entities, suspended server access. The Parler app was also booted from Google's and Apple's app stores after similar strong-arming from Washington. The ostensible reason for the unprecedented action was that Parler had allowed communications seeking 'to incite violence' in the U.S., specifically postings that had encouraged the riots at the U.S. Capitol on January 6. But the motivations for suppressing Parler were related less to incitement of violence (Facebook and Instagram had been the primary means of communication for most of the groups in question) and more concerned with censorship of unauthorized opinion. At the time of its shutdown, Parler had rapidly grown to 18 million users, due to the fact that, unlike other social media platforms, it refused to censor content at the behest of government authorities. While other sites were engaged in active shadow-banning of users, suppression of proscribed opinion, and other forms of censorship, Parler had become known as one of the last bastions of free expression. In just 24 hours, it went from being the number one app in America to digitally extinction. The trauma of being taken offline birthed the project on which I serve as an advisor — OPTIO, a blockchain infrastructure that makes such deplatforming impossible. We are not making it legally or politically impossible, mind you, but technologically impossible. This is the first such decentralized internet network of its kind. It can be used across a variety of applications, including social media, digital wallets, streaming platforms, and enterprise services. By eliminating centralized gatekeepers, we intend to empower users to participate in a transparent, censorship-resistant, and user-driven digital economy. Users will retain full control over their personal information, free from centralized exploitation. For the first time in human history, even a government with total control over its digital infrastructure cannot silence its people. The old playbook of tyrants determined to suppress information and control opinion is now officially dead. Authoritarian governments depend upon the control of information and the ability to disseminate an official narrative to their populations. Views contrary to the government-approved narrative cannot be tolerated, and platforms for alternative opinion or for organizing opposition groups are quickly dispatched. Unfortunately, authoritarian governments can easily use the tools developed over the last 30 years by big tech and the giant social media companies to construct a vast web of surveillance and censorship. And we're not just talking about Iran — this applies to Russia, China, North Korea, and even to the Big Tech-Big Government nexus in the U.S. The power to control information is the foundation of every authoritarian system. But now, that power is obsolete because of a technological innovation bigger than messaging apps or social media. The entire concept of government censorship is now threatened. The Iranian protesters flooding the streets of Tehran aren't just organizing demonstrations, they are demonstrating that the age of digital censorship is over. Big Tech and Big Government wanted to kill free speech in America in 2021. Instead they inspired the invention of a free speech firewall. What just happened in Iran proved that it works. Erik Finman is one of the youngest bitcoin millionaires and a major investor in Parler. He is also a tech entrepreneur and senior strategic advisor at OPTIO.
Yahoo
24-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
X Adds More Sports Engagement Options to Maintain Community Engagement
This story was originally published on Social Media Today. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Social Media Today newsletter. With Meta making a bigger push to lure sports communities over to its apps, X is looking to fight back, by adding various new sports engagement options which it hopes will enhance game day interaction in the app. X has been working on this since November last year, when it launched its new 'NFL Portal' element, which is designed to make it easier for users to stay up to date with key discussions around live NFL matches. As you can see in this example, the NFL Portal brings together posts from NFL teams, as well as key commentators, while also providing access to game schedules, live scores and stats. X added the same for NBA matches in April this year: And in the last week, X has also added some additional sports engagement elements, including updated share cards for sports games, and new score tracker notes on relevant posts. I mean, maybe you wouldn't want that, if you were hoping to catch the replay, but if you're looking up the event hashtag, you're likely fine with the score being spoiled. X users can also dock conversations about a live match, so they can keep on top of the discussion while X's video feed provides another means to share highlights in-stream. X will be hoping that this enhanced focus on sports discussion will prompt more engagement, and keep its top sports communities from migrating to other platforms instead. Because as noted, Meta's making a push for this audience as well. Meta already has a deal in place with the UFC, which will see exclusive, live content shared to Threads, while Threads now also has its own live score displays for in progress sporting events, which is a first step towards a similar game day hub like X. Meta has also made a specific point of highlighting that sports discussion is rising fast in the app, with some sports-related communities growing by millions in a matter of months. And amid the recent NBA Finals fanfare, Threads also hosted a live chat with ESPN's Malika Andrews to promote the event. In combination, you can see how Threads is looking to make inroads with this key discussion element, as another effort to put pressure on X. And given that sports is the biggest topic of discussion on X, that makes a lot of sense: The fact that X is now looking to add more sports engagement elements, and fast, suggests that Threads likely is making some progress on this front, and building its own sports-based communities, causing engagement challenges for the app. And if Threads can become more of a focal point for live sports discussion, that could fast become a major issue for Elon's social media project, which now runs the risk of becoming a bigger version of Parler or Truth Social, where political discussion becomes the domineering focus of the app. I suspect that many X users are not interested in such, but have largely been able to ignore it, in order to maintain their established sports communities. But if those groups start to fragment, and re-seed themselves on Threads instead, that could see a big chunk of X's usage filter away over time. I'd suggest that this is already happening, hence X's rethink of its sports elements, and the broader stats which show a decline in X usage. I also think that X is putting too much reliance on its Grok AI chatbot to drive engagement. Just this week, LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky noted that LinkedIn's AI-generated post creation tools aren't catching on as it had hoped they would, which could point to a broader shift away from AI as a creation tool. Don't get me wrong, there's clearly value in AI for some elements, including analytics, ad targeting, product image generation, etc. But for personal, creative use, in regards to providing post text options, reimagining images, generating video, etc. I don't think that there's going to be as much value in these aspects, from a general user standpoint. The risk then is that by making these tools more readily available in-stream, platforms will eventually become more and more inundated by AI slop, which will turn users away. You can already see this starting on TikTok, where AI-generated video posts (mostly created in Google Veo), lacking in originality or creativity, and are starting to overtake human-created content. Yet, it's the human-created content that facilitates connection and engagement, because there's nothing unique about animated video generated from a text prompt. Anyone can do it, with the only real differentiator being in the concept and the writing behind it. And standing out in that respect is much more difficult. X's continued push on Grok could lead to the same, and it'll be interesting to see how the platform looks to counter engagement losses with more features designed to enhance the user experience, in variance to this. Because if X starts losing its key discussion groups, it's going to lose, period.
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bluesky backlash misses the point
Bluesky is missing an opportunity to explain to people that its network is more than just its own Bluesky social app. In recent weeks, a number of headlines and posts have surfaced questioning whether Bluesky's growth is declining, if the network has become too much of a left-leaning echo chamber, or if its users lack a sense of humor, among other charges. Investor Mark Cuban, who even financially backed Skylight, a video app built on Bluesky's underlying protocol, AT Proto, complained this week that replies on Bluesky have become too hateful. 'Engagement went from great convos on many topics, to agree with me or you are a nazi fascist,' he wrote in a post on Bluesky. That, he said, is 'forcing' people to return to X. This embedded content is not available in your region. Naturally, X owner Elon Musk and CEO Linda Yaccarino have capitalized on this unrest, with the former posting that Bluesky is a 'bunch of super judgy hall monitors' and the latter proclaiming that X is the 'true' global town square. The debate around this topic is not surprising. Without a more direct push to showcase the wider network of apps built on the open protocol that Bluesky's team spearheaded, it was only a matter of time before the Bluesky brand became pigeon-holed as the liberal and leftist alternative to X. That characterization of Bluesky, however, is not a complete picture of what the company has been building — but it could become a stumbling block toward its further growth if not corrected. It's true that many of Bluesky's initial users are those who abandoned X because they were unhappy with its new ownership under Musk and its accompanying right-wing shift. After the November elections in the U.S., Bluesky's adoption soared as X users fled the platform headed by Trump's biggest individual backer. At the time, Bluesky was adding millions of users in rapid succession, climbing from north of 9 million users in September to nearly 15 million by mid-November and then 20 million just days later. That growth continued in the months that followed, as top Democrats like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton joined the app. Today, Bluesky has more than 36.5 million registered users, its public data indicates. It follows, then, that users' conversations around news and politics on Bluesky would help to define the network's tone as they became the dominant voices. Of course, that can spell trouble for any social network, as partisan apps on both the left, like Telepath, and right, like Parler, have failed to successfully challenge X. What's missing in this current narrative is the fact that Bluesky's social app is only meant to be one example of what's possible within the wider AT Proto ecosystem. If you don't like the tone of the topics trending on Bluesky, you can switch to other apps, change your default feeds, or even build your own social platform using the technology. Already, people are using the protocol that powers Bluesky to build social experiences for specific groups — like Blacksky is doing for the Black online community or like Gander Social is doing for social media users in Canada. There are also feed builders like Graze and those in Surf that let you create custom feeds where you can focus on specific content you care about — like video games or baseball — and exclude others, like politics. Built into Bluesky (and other third-party clients) are tools that let you pick your default feed and add others that interest you from a range of topics. If you want to follow a feed devoted to your favorite TV show or animal, for instance, you can. In other words, Bluesky is meant to be what you make it, and its content can be consumed in whatever format you prefer best. In addition to Bluesky itself, the wider network of apps built on the AT Protocol includes photo- and video-sharing apps, livestreaming tools, communication apps, blogging apps, music apps, movie and TV recommendation apps, and more. Other tools also let you combine feeds from Bluesky with other social networks. Openvibe, for instance, can mix together feeds from social networks like Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, and Nostr. Apps like Surf and Tapestry offer ways to track posts on open social platforms as well as those published with other open protocols like RSS. This lets the apps pull in content from blogs, news sites, YouTube, and podcasts. The team at Bluesky may not be the ones directly building these other social experiences and tools, but highlighting and promoting the existence of this wider, connected social network benefits Bluesky's brand. It shows that not only is Bluesky more than just a Twitter/X alternative, it's just one app in a wider social ecosystem built on open technology — and that's bigger than just building another X. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
