> For a start, the silencing competitors argument doesn't really work with AWS because they just do hosting.
The complaint alleges there are deeper ties:
Less than a month ago, AWS announced with a press release a new multi-year deal with Twitter. AWS will “provide global cloud infrastructure to deliver Twitter timelines.” Twitter Selects AWS as Strategic Provider to Serve Timelines, Press Center, Amazon, (Dec. 15, 2020), https://press.aboutamazon.com/news-releases/news-release-det....
That's a pretty typical-looking big customer kind of arrangement for a cloud provider (including the press release), not anything seemingly deeper than typical. (To be clear, I have no inside info on this deal to know for sure, but I've worked in the past at a different big cloud provider and later at a big customer of that cloud provider.)
That's definitely possible. I have no direct knowledge of the agreement, but it's one of those things that will get sussed out later--I suspect that the precise nature of the agreement will be gone over in detail.
That doesn't actually allege there are deeper ties. It's a pretty standard corporate PR piece about $SUPPLIER providing $SERVICE to $BIG_CUSTOMER, that $SUPPLIER can turn around and shop to other $PROSPECTIVE_CUSTOMERs as evidence of their ability to handle their needs. The company I work for puts this kind of PR out all the time, and no one thinks that it's a conspiracy to shut out all other competitors to $BIG_CUSTOMER.
On the other hand: the larger Twitter is, the easier it is for them to bargain hard with Amazon. A world with multiple competing Twitter-like services is potentially better for Amazon's bottom line.
That's a shame, because Greenwald and other contrarian writers have been the only ones consistently right the last few years with regards to Russiagate and other "emotional" headline issues.
Greenwald has actually been consistently wrong on quite a lot on that topic - mentioned quite a few places on the Wikipedia article actually.
I should stress that some partisan democrats have also been just as wrong, but Greenwald is just making it up to downplay what did actually happen.
To anyone who hasn't, please go and read the Wiki article on it - it's very detailed and clears up a lot of frankly worrying narratives I see on this website that are frankly a little disappointing considering the average reader is usually quite fastidious with technology.
For a start, the silencing competitors argument doesn't really work with AWS because they just do hosting.