Kanye West’s Parler purchase gives the rapper a place to be ‘controversial’—but who’s listening?

Ye (the artist formerly known as Kanye West) is a rap icon, a top-flight producer, and a highly successful fashion designer. But a social network owner? Buckle up, for Ye is buying Parler.

Parler, you may recall through the overstuffed haze of the past few years, gained a reputation as a haven for far-right extremists such as former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. In the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection last year, Google and Apple both kicked it out of their app stores; Apple let it back in a few months later, after Parler promised to step up its content moderation, and Google relented last month on the same basis. Also in September, Parler (the company behind the service) became Parlement Technologies, buying private cloud outfit Dynascale so it could offer “uncancelable” infrastructure services to those burned by Big Tech rejection.

Parlement now seems set to focus on the back end, with Ye picking up the social network side of the business for an undisclosed amount. Lest ye forget (sorry), the rapper was himself booted off Twitter and Instagram a week ago, with his account suspended for an unspecified time period, owing to rabidly anti–Semitic posts. Now he’s not just finding refuge on Parler, but buying it outright.

“In a world where conservative opinions are considered to be controversial, we have to make sure we have the right to freely express ourselves,” Ye said in a press release this morning that really leaned into the whole “controversial” thing from the get-go; it described Ye (net worth: $2 billion, per Forbes) as “the richest Black man in history,” which will come as a surprise to Nigerian business magnate Aliko Dangote (net worth: $12 billion).

In the release, Parlement CEO George Farmer said Ye was “making a groundbreaking move into the free speech media space and will never have to fear being removed from social media again.” But how many people will be paying attention to him?

Parler platform claims to have 16 million registered users, but active users are another matter; it got a miserly 1.3 million visits in August. That app-store exile was deeply damaging, and those who crave right-wing echo chambers can these days also opt for Gab, Gettr, and of course former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social. (Side note: I will never stop finding it funny that Trump and the Soviet Communist Party gravitated toward the same name.)

And then there’s Twitter itself. Assuming Elon Musk’s $44 billion takeover goes through, the Tesla/SpaceX/Boring mogul intends to make Twitter more of an anything-goes platform, with greater acceptance for people saying “pretty outrageous things within the law.” Indeed, Musk felt so pained about Ye’s suspension from Twitter that he talked to the musician and “expressed my concerns about his recent tweet, which I think he took to heart.” That doesn’t sound like someone who wants to keep Ye canceled.

It is perhaps telling that Parlement’s release says Ye’s purchase “will assure Parler a future role in creating an uncancelable ecosystem where all voices are welcome.” Given that the company just announced a $16 million Series B round at the same time as its Dynascale buy, it sounds a lot like its cloud pivot left the less-than-popular social network ripe for dumping, and Parlement just found the right scorned billionaire to pick it up—a deal no doubt aided by the fact that close Ye pal (and fellow “White Lives Matter” shirt wearer) Candace Owens is married to Farmer.

Good news for Parlement—but maybe not so much for Ye, who should perhaps have considered setting up a personal blog instead.

Got some feedback for today’s Data Sheet? Let me know here.

David Meyer

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