Former Parler CEO John Matze argues that the decision to ban the social media platform made by Big Tech giants, such as Amazon, should not be attributed to the founder.
Former Parler CEO John Matze said on Friday that he “doesn’t know exactly why” was fired from the company he built from scratch, but feels that his plan to make the social media platform “a little more pragmatic, respecting freedom of expression “was not embraced by the council.
“Jared, the other co-founder and I, designed and architect the original software. I made most of the iPhone app myself, coded it for the first two and a half years, so due to recent stress and everything that’s going on, there have been some hindrances, back and forth, but I don’t understand, yet for today, why I got fired, ”Matze told” Mornings with Maria “host Maria Bartiromo, adding that” I think they just don’t know what’s going on “
PARLER CEO JOHN MATZE SAYS IT WAS ENDED BY THE COUNCIL: ‘I DID NOT PARTICIPATE IN THIS DECISION’
In a staff memo obtained by FOX Business on Wednesday, Matze noted that “Parler’s board controlled by Rebekah Mercer decided to immediately terminate my position as CEO” and that he “did not participate in this decision”.
In the memo, Matze added that in the past few months he has encountered “constant resistance” to his original vision for the social media platform after Amazon Web Services’ decision to shut down Parler for failure to moderate “shocking content” related to the Capitol riot in 6 of January.
“In the past few months, I have encountered constant resistance to my product vision, my strong belief in freedom of speech and my vision of how the Parler website should be managed. For example, I have advocated more product stability and what I believe is a more effective approach for moderating content, “wrote Matze.
Bartiromo asked Matze against what the council was resisting, noting that he had a vision of an “opportunity for freedom of expression in a world where we see censorship on so many platforms” on social media.
“Recently, having been removed from Apple stores and removed Google Play and Amazon from us, I thought it was probably a good time to start being a little more pragmatic and still respect freedom of expression. And so, my concept was the idea of adding AI and other technologies to the platform to be more proactive, especially in times of escalation, but then to have a system in place so that every decision made by these authoritative style devices like IAs and others , so that you could have a third party come and say, ‘Hey, I don’t agree with the decision these guys made,’ ”explained Matze.
“You can then go ahead and challenge him and he will be sent to a jury by his peers,” added Matze. “That was my idea and my concept … That was my vision of the future for the moderation front, but I don’t really know what was the biggest disconnect. This was not explained to me. “
Parler fired CEO John Matze last week. (Photo by Jaap Arriens / NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Matze then said the Telegram messaging app has seen an increase in popularity since Parler was taken offline, but efforts are being made by Big Tech to reduce that as well.
“It’s really interesting to see how people have changed since Parler went offline because it was the right place,” he said. “We will see what happens.”
Parler’s policy director, Amy Peikoff, responded to Matze’s memo on Thursday with a forceful statement provided to Fox News that called her version of the events “inaccurate and misleading”. Peikoff agreed with Fox News contributor and Parler investor Dan Bongino, who had a problem with Matze’s claims that he was the person fighting for free speech on the platform and took his thoughts to Facebook. Bartiromo showed a part of Bongino’s video in which he said that Matze and the company did not share the same view. Bartiromo asked Matze his reaction to the video.
“Dan’s explanation was the first I heard from the company … Dan is not a manager, he has never been in the company’s office and talked to maybe two employees in total and is very new to the company. I mean, I was there for two and a half years before he came in, so I don’t know if that explanation is correct. I think my vision is very much in line with what they are saying, “said Matze.” I don’t think that anything I said before was very misaligned. “
Matze said it was time to be pragmatic and felt it was not fair to blame him for Amazon’s “unprecedented” decision to ban Parler.
PARLER’S CO-OWNER, BONGINO, RESPONSES COMPLAINTS FROM OUSTED CEO JOHN MATZE: ‘TIME TO CORRECT REGISTRATION’
“Especially considering that we have several backups that also discarded us, so I don’t think they know what they are talking about and I think they are improvising. I think there is something more at stake and I’m not sure what it is and it doesn’t make sense why you would wait five days to tell employees, ”said Matze.
Matze said he urged the Parler administration to issue a joint statement on his departure, but they resisted. After five days of silence, he wrote the memo to employees.
“I just don’t think they know what’s going on,” he said. “That is all.”
Matze told Bartiromo that Parler will have to adopt many of the moderation policies and procedures he proposed, despite his termination, if the platform comes back.
“The only thing that worries me is that they will not have, sort of, certifying, testing and working with the engineers to ensure that the new terms of service application, they will not accept me to ensure that it will be perfect,” he said . “It can end up being overly aggressive or not aggressive enough … They need to go online as soon as possible because, every day that they are not online, they are losing more and more market share.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT FOX BUSINESS
Matze told Parler’s team that he will take a few weeks off before looking for a new venture.
“I think I have a lot of opportunities coming up,” he said to Bartiromo. “Nobody thought that Facebook was contestable or Twitter was contestable … I think we made a big impact on the Twitter space, so I think I have a lot of opportunities.”