It has been a few weeks since I went all in on “alternative social media”.  Meaning I left Twitter and Facebook and started using MeWe, Gab, LBRY, Telegram and Parler full time.  So far my results are a mixed bag and some of it is really positive.  Here is a quick update on my thoughts for each service so far…

• Parler – This one has been the most impressive.  Big names keep coming on board over at Parler.  I now personally have over 2,000 followers and the engagement is great.   I booked a guest spot with Stefan Molyneux and have opened up a dialog with some other prominent names.  I have had half a dozen posts catch fire and get over 30,000 views and hundreds of “echos” (shares on Parler)
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  The founder and Parler support continue to interact with me and other users and take our requests seriously.  They seem dedicated to making the platform amazing and not being shadow banned is awesome.  The value of my Parler account is already worth more to me vs. my twitter account with far more followers.  I would say about 60-70% of my followers on Parler are not from the TSP audience which is a great expansion of influence and brings new blood to the TSPC community.
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  They now have video uploads working well though long videos take a while to upload and if you publish before they are done things get buggy.  Short videos seem to function really well and they are best for the platform anyway.
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  Display bugs are another issue.  Many times when you drop in a URL it won’t display right.  Most times if you don’t share it, simply refresh the page and drop it in a second time that resolves  Though sometimes it won’t.  YouTube videos in particular seem buggy when you share them.  I do think based on feedback from @parlersupport this will all continue to improve.  Parler seems on course to be a dominant player in social media over the next year.  If you are an influencer I say get on now while there is still considerable first mover advantage.  Of all the platforms I am now working on, this one is by far my favorite as a marketer and as a public personality.
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• MeWe – I have found MeWe to be almost the same as facebook for me minus the censorship when it comes to everything related to my work with TSPC.  The TSPC Group is very active with great discussion and a lot of people in the group use the group chat feature.
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  Much like Parler, MeWe often has display issues with some URLs again YouTube is the most common one.  Facebook has the same thing happen but facebook has a tool to debug and force a rescrape.  I wish MeWe had such a tool.
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  I also really wish MeWe had live video, other than that it has been great.  The one thing I really miss on MeWe is my personal friends who are not there.  The people you just want to keep up with as to their daily lives.  I am hoping I can get more of these folks on Parler or Mewe soon.
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• Gab – So far I am not loving Gab and I am not putting enough work into building my presence there so some of it may be on me.  If I had to describe Gab in one word it would be buggy.  If you gave me three words it would be “buggy as shit”.
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  Often when you make a post it won’t show up for a while, when you delete a post sometimes it takes a while to go away and sometimes it won’t go away.  Same with edits.  When you block assholes sometimes it takes a day to stop seeing their shit.  You see a lot of stuff in your feeds that are from people you don’t follow.  I want to like Gab and honestly may be I just need to learn more about it, I will take some time to give it a fair shake over the next few weeks.
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  Here is one example where it may be buggy or I may just not get it yet.  When you post something and want to share it to a group (like facebook or MeWe) you can’t, that option does not exist.  So you have to post it into the group as an original post separately.
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  Given I see groups I am not part of I am wondering if when a person you follow posts to a group you see it simply because you follow the person.  If so that is kind of cool, if not, just more buggy shit.  I also ran into a good number of racist shit bags on Gab, but once blocked they seemed to dry up pretty fast.
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• Telegram – I initially got on Telegram to have communications with the Unloose the Goose crew but later set up a TSPC group there.  It is VERY active with a small number of dedicated folks.  I may set up a Telegram broadcast group too.  That would be where I send you guys a message only, you can’t post back.  It would just be for announcements and such.  The fact that you can do both types is really cool.
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  I am getting more and more friends and family onto it because for two way coms it is end to end encrypted.  It turns out that group chats are not encrypted so if you want to have private coms with someone keep it off a group and in DMs, this is a good practice anyway because you never know who is in a group.  All in Telegram works and does so flawlessly, they now have video calls as well.  I predict this one is just going to keep getting better, everyone should be using this over FB Messenger or the native Chat App on your phone.
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• LBRY – This has been another home run.  Once I found out that all my uploads to YouTube could be set to automatically publish to LBRY I was hooked.  In the last three weeks I have made about 80 bucks in LBC coin on LBRY.  Not a ton but this is about 25% of what YouTube ads made in the same period and YouTube earnings are up for me this month.  More to the point my following on LBRY is a fraction of what it is on YouTube.  So if I can build anything close to what I have on YouTube on LBRY it will be a much more profitable platform already and this with LBC coin at only 3 cents a coin.
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  There also seems to be a way to post blogs vs. videos on LBRY and I need to dig into how to do that.  There is also a way to share the content of others. I have been doing that and I need to organize a group that agrees to share each others stuff regularly because LBRY actually gives you LBC coin when you do it so it is a no brainer.  I will likely use TeleGram to manage that group!
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  LBRY does have some play back issues at times, I do like that every video ported in from YouTube includes a link back to the YouTube version when that happens.  All in, this platform seems like it is good and eventually it will be great.  Anyone on YouTube who is regularly publishing content should get on LBRY if for no other reason to have a back up of your work if YouTube ever shuts you down, because it happens.
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So that is it so far.  I can say that with the crazy shit that has gone on on Facebook since I left I am very happy with that decision.  If you want to know more about what Facebook is doing to you and with your data check out this little site the guys at Parler came up with, EraseBook.info.  It is no surprise that Facebook has censored that site!

Anyway if you use social media, online video services and/or texting consider these services and consider hooking up with me on them.

Links for My Profiles and Tech Platforms

• Jack on Parler
• Jack on MeWe
• Jack on Gab
• The Telegram App
• The TSPC Telegram Group (won’t work unless the app is installed)
• Join me on  LBRY.tv
• Get FireFox
• Get Brave
• DuckDuckGo FireFox Extension