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Social Network Gab.com being threatened by GoDaddy: 24 hours to transfer or suspension

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domainguy50

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backstory: Gab is a social network alternative to twitter. their selling point is free speech (all speech is welcome, including what you believe might be hate speech.) which is basically is the first amendment. no unlawful material is allowed, but virtually any speech is. recently they purchased the "gab com" domain for $220k.

this site is very controversial as a result, with mainstream media outlets claiming it is popular with nazi and anti-semite messages. the site has 800,000 users and has experienced modest growth recently so it really isnt all bad hate speech. regardless, those disgusting messages on the site by some users are also lawful no matter how distasteful they are. as a result of these media attacks, (and the recent revelation that the synagogue shooter in pittsburgh yesterday had an active gab profile) gab is being unfairly targeted by smear campaigns online reporting the site as "a hate speech site" via email to gab's service providers.

gabs host (microsoft) revoked its contract with gab a few months ago

gabs payment providers (paypal and stripe) just revoked their services

just a few minutes ago, godaddy has said they will stop working with gab:
(i cant post the image or link idk why)
"BREAKING: Godaddy is threatening to suspend our domain (which is worth six figures) if we do not transfer to a new provider by tomorrow. This is madness."

the complexity of the situation is compounded by the fact that Gab is on a payment plan to fully own the domain since they recently purchased it. the broker/escrow agent control this which makes it even more difficult for the company to transfer to a new registrar by EOD tomorrow.

I understand that Godaddy is a private business and its clauses may allow it to do this, but this seems extreme overreaction. "24 hours to transfer or else" is a very menacing way of doing business.

-if you were in charge of gab what would you do? create your own payment processor, host, and DNS? they got deplatformed quickly... i guess they could try to get an offshore Hosting company or invest in native hosting.

-what is the most "free speech" friendly DNS provider there is?

-is it fair for internet infrastructure companies to de-platform a small upstart social network because of controversial speech? or should companies like DNS and hosting should be regulated and allow any customer as long as it is lawful content being hosted.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
@Recons.Com looks like you hate Rob because of his religion..

That is dumb thing to say!

1. I respect all religions
2. I respect truly religious people that are not religious nuts and don't try to force their version of God or their idea of what God wants onto everyone else
3. I don't believe the members of the politically active groups holding religious banners are actually religious. Again, a man with truly God in his heart would never have as their leader someone who brags about groping other people's wifes.
4. I definitely hope the point 3 is not your religion.
5. Don't try to label people with your limited and narrow worldview.
 
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That is dumb thing to say!

1. I respect all religions
2. I respect truly religious people that are not religious nuts and don't try to force their version of God or their idea of what God wants onto everyone else
3. I don't believe the members of the politically active groups holding religious banners are actually religious. Again, a man with truly God in his heart would never have as their leader someone who brags about groping other people's wifes.
4. I definitely hope the point 3 is not your religion.
5. Don't try to label people with your limited and narrow worldview.

For the record, I love @Recons.Com :)

Also, I am actually not a fan of religion. I am not affiliated with a denomination and rarely go to a physical church. I believe in churches without walls -- the ekklesia as it is known in the Greek.

And yes, Trump was a fallen man as are we all. The jury is out whether DJT-POTUS is leading the country to something better or not. Christians are told to pray for their leaders in order to live peaceably. Looking ahead, despite all of the chaos and suffering that exists in this world, I do believe that it is an instant in the scheme of eternity. As with forever domains, I am fascinated by eternity.

As for this thread, it really is about the future of domains. If every small business and every small publisher is at risk of losing their livelihood, the upside of owning domains would drop materially. At the end of the day, monopolies of commerce and media are a bad trend vis-a-vis the plurality that is made possible by uniquely ownable registries and in turn uniquely ownable domains.

Apologies to anyone who I offended personally with my remarks in this thread. It is my sincere hope that the NamePros community can find some unity in the utility of private, sovereign domain ownership.
 
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That is dumb thing to say!

1. I respect all religions
2. I respect truly religious people that are not religious nuts and don't try to force their version of God or their idea of what God wants onto everyone else
3. I don't believe the members of the politically active groups holding religious banners are actually religious. Again, a man with truly God in his heart would never have as their leader someone who brags about groping other people's wifes.
4. I definitely hope the point 3 is not your religion.
5. Don't try to label people with your limited and narrow worldview.

You show hostility towards him. It was you who first said "leave God out of this" and after that you are talking about religion in all your posts.

Regarding point no. 3, I believe the same, all political groups holding religious banners are not religious and are using the religion card to get votes.
And no. 4, I am not a Christian.

Don't you think you are the one labeling people? Re-read your posts again, To me it looked like you not only disrespect religions but mock the followers of all religions too. I may have misjudged you, sorry about that.
 
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Isn't it funny that God fearing and loving Evangelists are the biggest and most ardent supporters of a man who cheated on his wifes and admitted on record on grabbing by p**sy wifes of other Christians?

Leave God out of this.

They also supported Bill Clinton, George Bush and Barack Obama.
 
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This is dumb analogy. As for God creating people nude; God made clothes for both Adam and Eve.

Rob is not arguing about standards, he's against de-platforming a business who's standard is "free speech"


And yet, you did not answer:

Why is nudity against your TOS?

Doesn't your God create humans nude? Why you play God and decide who is ok nude and who is not OK nude and why some nudes continue on your registrar if it is clearly against your TOS?
 
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You show hostility towards him. It was you who first said "leave God out of this" and after that you are talking about religion in all your posts.

Regarding point no. 3, I believe the same, all political groups holding religious banners are not religious and are using the religion card to get votes.
And no. 4, I am not a Christian.

Don't you think you are the one labeling people? Re-read your posts again, To me it looked like you not only disrespect religions but mock the followers of all religions too. I may have misjudged you, sorry about that.

Look, I am religious person, but I am too humble to assume to know what God wants to the extend that to force it onto other people.

However, considerable part of population will happily do this either because they are under-educated and easily brainwashed or because they have zero fear of God and will manipulate the brainwashed group into whatever is in their interests.

And, interestingly, these groups of people are the same regardless of the religion. They share the same methods and rhetoric, regardless if it is religious nuts in Saudi Arabia or religious nuts in the USA.

Regarding Mr. Rob, my being critical of him is not because of his religion.

I got an impression that he is trying to use the controversy for free publicity.

If a platform is attracting mostly supremacists and racists, it means all the free speech talk is nothing but fluff for them and they use their own speak and winks to have this safe haven for neo-fascists.

The Gab platform has chosen as a logo a symbol used by those groups, basically new "swastika" for them and it was pointed out in this thread, but he chose to ignore that and still wants to talk to the owner.

Mr Rob:

here it is again:

2000px-Gab_Logo.svg.png


and here is article about Pepe:

https://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/29/who-is-pepe-the-frog-and-why-has-he-become-a-hate-symbol.html

But I suspect you already knew all these.
 
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This is dumb analogy. As for God creating people nude; God made clothes for both Adam and Eve.

Rob is not arguing about standards, he's against de-platforming a business who's standard is "free speech"

I am sure only your analogies are smart. By your logic, God also made burqas and therefore people can be forced to wear those too.

How GD's de-platforming a business based on a hate speech promotion is different from Epik's ability to de-platform any business because there might be a nude pic that Rob in his own discretion might find offensive? Basically, per TOS any business that might have a nude photo used is a priori in violation of his TOS.
 
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This is dumb analogy. As for God creating people nude; God made clothes for both Adam and Eve.

Rob is not arguing about standards, he's against de-platforming a business who's standard is "free speech"

I am sure only your analogies are smart. By your logic, God also made burqas and therefore people can be forced to wear those too.

How GD's de-platforming a business based on a hate speech promotion is different from Epik's ability to de-platform any business because there might be a nude pic that Rob in his own discretion might find offensive? Basically, per TOS any business that might have a nude photo used is a priori in violation of his TOS.

I agree with Recons on this one. If you want to argue about free speech, then unless something is illegal, it could be considered "free speech" including nude content. If Epik wants to arbitrarily remove sites that host content like that I don't see how that is not the same violation of free speech.

It would be removed because it offends someone or is not good for business, which is the same standard being applied by 3rd party companies that no longer want to do business with Gab.

Nudity has many forms. Some is artistic but some is not. For example, we reserve the right not to host bestiality content. It is implied.

Bestiality is clearly not comparable, as it is illegal in the vast majority of states, and therefore you have a legal obligation to remove it.
 
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More Alinsky playbook claptrap.

For those uninitiated, here is the recap:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_for_Radicals

  • "Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have."
  • "Never go outside the expertise of your people."
  • "Whenever possible go outside the expertise of the enemy."
  • "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules."
  • "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon."
  • "A good tactic is one your people enjoy."
  • "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag."
  • "Keep the pressure on."
  • "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself."
  • "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition."
  • "If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside"
  • "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."

  • "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it."
JBL is playing track #4.

Oh, this nonsense. So I'm a radical now? lol. It seems you couldn't form a rational response in a reply, you just ran from it.

Again, not complicated.

If somebody has porn content, they wouldn't use you or Bluehost, since it's against the TOS. So then you would use somebody that is ok with it.

If somebody deals in hate content, then you wouldn't use companies that have an issue with it. You would use companies that are ok with it, like the example above. They're up and running again.

So when a company enforces their TOS, you're on here rambling about letting freedom ring and censorship but you engage in the same type of stuff with porn.

Just catching up on some of the other nonsense posted:

As for this thread, it really is about the future of domains.

Now go reread your reply to me. Trying to use old school fear tactics.

I got an impression that he is trying to use the controversy for free publicity.

He got the link into forever domains, way to get some advertising in. Which really doesn't make any sense financially for most. It would be cheaper for most just to have it on auto-renew. It's like 50 years worth of renewals.
 
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Godaddy hosts these people on their platform, but expells GAB. How does this even fit in the terms of service?

“Pigs in blanket, fry em’ like Bacon”. Inciting riots, vandalism, hate speech about murdering police.
 
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The risk of arguing in forums is that text is faceless and voiceless and we tend to get overly emotional and defensive.

I think we should all dial back on all these, as topics of free speech, abortion, guns etc. are never easy and everyone gets too emotional.

I can believe that Rob just disliked closing a social platform with a one day notice and is not too much into what this social platform exactly is and I can also see that TOS might be just a legal text to overprotect the company and the owner might never have intention of enforcing those points.

Let us all just keep an open mind!
 
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Look, I am religious person, but I am too humble to assume to know what God wants to the extend that to force it onto other people.

However, considerable part of population will happily do this either because they are under-educated and easily brainwashed or because they have zero fear of God and will manipulate the brainwashed group into whatever is in their interests.

And, interestingly, these groups of people are the same regardless of the religion. They share the same methods and rhetoric, regardless if it is religious nuts in Saudi Arabia or religious nuts in the USA.

Regarding Mr. Rob, my being critical of him is not because of his religion.

I got an impression that he is trying to use the controversy for free publicity.

If a platform is attracting mostly supremacists and racists, it means all the free speech talk is nothing but fluff for them and they use their own speak and winks to have this safe haven for neo-fascists.

The Gab platform has chosen as a logo a symbol used by those groups, basically new "swastika" for them and it was pointed out in this thread, but he chose to ignore that and still wants to talk to the owner.

Mr Rob:

here it is again:

and here is article about Pepe:


But I suspect you already knew all these.

First off the original gab frog logo has nothing to do with pepe. Gab Ceo said it was chosen because the frog is a symbolic animal in the Torah in which it symbolizes the struggle for liberation.

The frog is not the logo anymore by the way, gab has redesigned recently after they bought the dot com domain
 
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Epik is not a social platform for free speech.

The point Rob is making; A lot of companies working together to remove a site dedicated to free and open speech, in part taking out their competition. No time to make corrections or adjust their polices.

My take: All of these platforms allow similar subjects from some people but not others. In example, when Kanye visited the WH, a lot of people called him house negro and worse. When a conservative black man quoted those insults, his account was limited.

I agree with Recons on this one. If you want to argue about free speech, then unless something is illegal, it could be considered "free speech" including nude content. If Epik wants to arbitrarily remove sites that host content like that I don't see how that is not the same violation of free speech.

It would be removed because it offends someone or is not good for business, which is the same standard being applied by 3rd party companies that no longer want to do business with Gab.



Bestiality is clearly not comparable, as it is illegal in the vast majority of states, and therefore you have a legal obligation to remove it.
 
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First off the original gab frog logo has nothing to do with pepe. Gab Ceo said it was chosen because the frog is a symbolic animal in the Torah in which it symbolizes the struggle for liberation.

The frog is not the logo anymore by the way, gab has redesigned recently after they bought the dot com domain

Gab CEO would never admit otherwise. They are ok creating alternative realities (alternative facts, if you like).

I got curious, any Torah experts here? Does frog really symbolize struggle for liberation and is a symbolic animal there? Can't recall anything of this kind, except, of course, never give up meme. But it can't be that one, since wee only its butt there :)

never-give-up.jpg
 
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Epik is not a social platform for free speech.

The point Rob is making; A lot of companies working together to remove a site dedicated to free and open speech, in part taking out their competition. No time to make corrections or adjust their polices.

My take: All of these platforms allow similar subjects from some people but not others. In example, when Kanye visited the WH, a lot of people called him house negro and worse. When a conservative black man quoted those insults, his account was limited.

Or.......there are a bunch of degenerates online that wake up everyday thinking what kind of hate meme can I make today, and other hate speech. They want a place to be free to do that and meet other degenerates. There is a market for it. This was one of their main hangouts. And when the owner says he's not going to go around policing it, even better. From what he's said in interviews and elsewhere (see photo I posted earlier) to the little green frog, he was signaling all over the place. Free speech sounds better than hate speech, just like States Rights sounds better than the right to own Slaves. But people know what it's really about.

Last year, pretty much the same discussion - https://www.google.com/search?clien....1..gws-wiz.......0i71j0i67j0i131.GgRRNS2-pJA

See that, up and running again. Not sure what part of big companies don't want any part of this type of stuff, its bad for business, that people don't understand. What part of, it violates their TOS, you don't understand.This incident probably pushed them over. Again, no shortage of Conservatives on these social media sites. They're still there because they follow the TOS.

Instead of crying all over the internet about it, just use places that are ok with it. They're out there. Or start your own deal. Go start the next Hatreon. This is just something that bonds some people together, the old, they're out to get us stuff.

Side note, false flag was mentioned earlier. That's a term used today by extreme right wing nutters. You have something like Sandy Hook where 20 kids between 6 and 7 years old were murdered and you have nuts like Alex Jones calling it a false flag, hoax, crisis actors etc. Not going to normalize nutters. Can you imagine a parent that just had their child murdered and somebody like Alex Jones comes with the conspiracy nonsense.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-n...ars-sandy-hook-conspiracy-targets-ask-n892926

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/14/alex-jones-5-most-disturbing-ridiculous-conspiracy-theories.html
 
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I had a chance to do some more research on this Gab / Kek / Pepe the Frog topic today as well as speak to some of the folks on this Board one on one who have more knowledge on this topic than I do.

Here is where I net out:

- Mainstream Media is largely co-opted and controlled. It has led to a proliferation of alternative media. Some alternative media has gone beyond alt-right (e.g. Andrew Breitbart, Bill Cooper) to become malevolent and even militarized, perhaps not unlike past groups on right and left, e.g. Weather Underground, Black Panthers, who radicalized dialog and discourse into destruction and mayhem.

- Law enforcement has amble ability to know who visits which sites, for how long, and contributing which content. While full privacy is theoretically achievable it is practically hard to scale. Telegram channels are potentially a candidate but for the moment the experience is like bad Skype. On the positive side, it seems Gab management cooperated with law enforcement.

- A free web allows anyone to search out the truth. Anyone who wants to know the inner secrets of occult groups, secret societies, witchcraft, etc. It is all there. Symbols and sigils are generally well documented. If you know how to spot them, you know with whom you are dealing and what they believe and/or value. If the Kek/Pepe icon in Gab's official branding, as appears from their merchandise, that would be troubling.

Specific to the false flag topic, since I raised it, I will address it. There is a history of this method, often in the context of Hegelian Dialectic. It is worth understanding its historical use as tool for influencing popular opinion (e.g. Gulf of Tonkin, the Erdogan 2016 "Coup"). I don't doubt that people are dying tragically. What we don't know is how many of these cases are facilitated, fomented, or otherwise anticipated.

Thanks for a good discussion and for the education about Pepe. Anyone who has been able to research the Pepe topic today on the web has been a beneficiary of a free web where countless websites catalog their findings. Specific to Gab.com, if their site continues, I do hope that it functions more like a Reddit free-for-all and not an open magnet for hate. In essence, that is why I am willing to speak to the CEO.
 
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Someone mentioned it already but for those interested it's really interesting to read up on what happened to the daily stormer.

It's not just Godaddy. The daily stormer moved to a couple of registrars and was taken down by all of them (namecheap, namesilo, etc). Even cloudflare and easydns booted them (dns hosting) if I recall correctly. I don't condone what they have to say and in the end of the day every business should decide for themselves who they want to do busness with. However, in my opinion it's never the place of the registrar to supsend a domain due to the content they host.

Same goes for gab. I don't know the site. If they advocate hate speech, let the lawyers take care of them. If content is found to be illegal, and only then, get a court order out to their host and shut them down.

Most of the time when a registrar points you to their TOS it's just because they're afraid of bad publicity and cave in under pressure by media or stakeholders. I get it, they're running a business and it's always a though call but it's disappointing when they choose the easy way out.

Anybody following this particular case closely, please keep us updated as I'm curious how this will evolve and what registar they end up with.

As for Epik, I think it takes a lot of balls for a CEO to come to a forum like this, take a stance on religion and even concider to help a site like gab which clearly isn't something most Christians would even think about. Nothing but respect for that!
 
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Isn't there a registrar where the daily stormer or the gab could have moved where
they wouldn't be shut down?
 
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Isn't there a registrar where the daily stormer or the gab could have moved where they wouldn't be shut down?
The one I posted earlier, where the Stormer is at - http://www.now.top/ - ERANET INTERNATIONAL LIMITED

He can just follow their path. Apparently he was posting on Gab as well:

"In September 2017, Gab faced pressure from its domain registrar to take down a post by The Daily Stormer founder Andrew An glin."

Just has to contact him, he already went thru the change. I'm sure he can advise them.
 
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But surely, in the land where the first amendment guarantees free speech,
there must be a registrar in the United States that will allow the gab and
the Stormer to have their web sites..
 
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The domain is on the move.

This morning:

Domain Name: gab.com
Registry Domain ID: 4274190_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.godaddy.com
Registrar URL: http://www.godaddy.com
Updated Date: 2018-09-18T16:23:14Z
Creation Date: 1998-12-08T05:00:00Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-12-07T05:00:00Z
Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC
Registrar IANA ID: 146
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: [email protected]
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +1.4806242505
Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited http://www.icann.org/epp#clientTransferProhibited
Domain Status: clientUpdateProhibited http://www.icann.org/epp#clientUpdateProhibited
Domain Status: clientRenewProhibited http://www.icann.org/epp#clientRenewProhibited
Domain Status: clientDeleteProhibited http://www.icann.org/epp#clientDeleteProhibited
Registry Registrant ID: Not Available From Registry
Registrant Name: Registration Private
Registrant Organization: Domains By Proxy, LLC
Registrant Street: DomainsByProxy.com
Registrant Street: 14455 N. Hayden Road
Registrant City: Scottsdale
Registrant State/Province: Arizona

Now:

Domain Name: gab.com
Registry Domain ID: 4274190_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.godaddy.com
Registrar URL: http://www.godaddy.com
Updated Date: 2018-09-18T16:23:14Z
Creation Date: 1998-12-08T05:00:00Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-12-07T05:00:00Z
Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC
Registrar IANA ID: 146
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: [email protected]
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +1.4806242505
Domain Status: ok http://www.icann.org/epp#ok
Registrant Organization: Escrow.com
Registrant State/Province: CA
Registrant Country: US

Unlocked and held by Escrow.com.

DNS is still Cloudflare.

We'll see where it lands.
 
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Because your post isnt sincere, you are defending them and spinning them as just a "social network". Some of the worst people use that service to spew hate. They could have cleaned it up, but they know that they only exist because of all the things I mentioned.

Stormfront, Infowars, GAB and a few others are what fuels these domestic terrorists.
This. This looks like a complete astroturf post!
 
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Are you planning to host them?

I invited a conversation with the CEO but beyond that nothing committed at this time.
 
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In reality, it won't be shutdown. Because intolerant jack-holes consider anything that contradicts the current liberal pet peeve as hate speech it will probably get worse.


Gabs logo is a smiling green frog. Its a variation of "Pepe the Frog", a once funny cartoon that has been appropriated by neo-nazis, white supremacists and the alt-right. Originally they were going to use Pepe himself, but Matt Furie who designed it, has been suing these groups who are abusing his art work. So they made their own "Pepe".

If Gab is such an innocent social network, you have to wonder why they chose that graphic. I'm glad Gab is being shut down, it never stood for free speech, it was a safe-haven for these far-right hate groups.
 
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