Freerepublic was formed at the beginning of a freewheeling Internet. Those times are past.
Freerepublic uses software developed by its founder, Jim Robinson. It is a barrier to develop independent original software.
Freerepublic does not depend on ads. It depends on donations. It barely survives. The number of people donating are tiny. As I recall, less than 1% of Freerepublic members.
The software and banking institutions used to fund donations are being weaponized against conservatives. They are tightly centralized and controlled by leftists.
The amount of money required to start and develop a social media has become very large. It has become a barrier.
The use of Social Justice Warriors (SJW) to destroy platforms that disagree with conservative platforms, is a barrier. Anyone who is willing to place an ad with a conservative platform will be attacked on the existing platforms.
The barriers to entry are there, because it is much harder to build a competing railroad when there are several railroads already operating.
I am not saying a platform cannot be developed, but it will be difficult.
I would love to see it happen.
Working on exactly that, an the train as we say is well down the tracks. It gets very deep into the very premise of all the data collection they are really about, trying to figure out who we are and will buy or use and then using so called analytics predict our behaviors. But they have some fatal flaws in their premise, like over 7 billion people who may all be human but we still have quirks that cannot be codified or stuffed into a box forever
Aye the games afoot indeed, and I am not going back nor giving ground, I hate paying for the same ground twice...
Sic Semper Tyrranis!
PS - The foundational code for what I am building already exists, it is how it is implemented, supplemented and secured that makes a difference. And in 42 + years in high tech I have people I trust who get it and share the vision. In short a monolithic non focused social media model will never work..
That is all I will say about that
Carry on