Donald Trump, former president of the United States of America is set to announce the launch of his own social media platform nine months after being expelled from social media for his role in inciting the January 6 Capitol insurrection.
According to the Associated Press, Trump revealed on Wednesday, October 20 that he is launching a new media company Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG), and its “Truth Social” app.
This he said is to create a rival to the Big Tech companies that have shut him out and denied him the megaphone that was paramount to his national rise.
“We live in a world where the Taliban has a huge presence on Twitter, yet your favourite American President has been silenced,” he said in a statement. “This is unacceptable.”
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Trump has spoken about launching his own social media site ever since he was barred from Twitter and Facebook. An earlier effort to launch a blog on his existing website was abandoned after the page drew dismal views.
TMTG has not set its sights low. In addition to the Truth Social app, which is expected to soft-launch next month with a nationwide rollout early next year, the company says it is planning a video-on-demand service dubbed TMTG+ that will feature entertainment programming, news and podcasts.
One slide in a TMTG presentation on its website includes a graphic of TMTG’s potential competitors, which range from Facebook and Twitter to Netflix and Disney+ to CNN.
The same slide suggests that over the long term TMTG will also become a power in cloud computing and payments and suggests it will go head-to-head with Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Stripe.
TMTG also takes some jabs at Trump’s previous favourite social network. Slides accompanying the Truth Social pre-orders listing in Apple’s app store depict a social network that strongly resembles Twitter, right down to short messages and user handles preceded by “@” signs.
