Following bans of Infowars' content, its mobile app has shot up iOS App Store and Google Play Store charts, going from 47th to 4th in US news category on iOS
and thrive David Pierini / Cult of Mac : Alex Jones ‘patriots’ rush to App Store to download Infowars app Elizabeth Williamson / New York Times : Alex Jones Urges Infowars Fans to Fight Back, and Send Money Jeremy Horwitz / VentureBeat : Apple CEO reportedly nixed Infowars podcasts, but kept now-surging app Tweets: Max Read / @max_read : one lesson of the Infowars stuff is that the only entities that have the power to compel megaplatforms like facebook are ... other megaplatforms like apple http://nymag.com/... Casey Newton / @caseynewton : These “platforms only disciplined Infowars because Apple did first” takes ignore the fact that Stitcher, Spotify, YouTube and Facebook all removed Infowars content before Apple did http://nymag.com/... Andrew Lawrence / @ndrew_lawrence : You guys were suspending people for changing their screen name to “Elon Musk” https://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Someone should tell Alex Jones to read his site's Terms of Service. “It is not censorship if you violate the rules and your post is deleted. All civilizations have rules and if you violate them you can expect to be ostracized from the tribe.” (first spotted by @JerryDunleavy) pic.twitter.com/891B6x71Eg Peter Todd / @peterktodd : Android allows users to sideload apps, bypassing the centralized app store, Apple does not. Apple banning Infowars would be taking the position that you shouldn't be allowed to access that speech on an Apple device. A dangerous position to take... http://www.theverge.com/... Sarah Lerner / @sarahlerner : InfoWars' social media team had a Pinterest strategy?? I'm losing my mind. http://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Apple can do whatever it pleases, obviously. But I'm still really confused why you can ban podcasts for violating your hate speech guidelines but not apply that same thing to an app that livestreams the exact same shows... https://www.theverge.com/... pic.twitter.com/6LfOK5FCik Steve Kovach / @stevekovach : Google wouldn't comment specifically on why the InfoWars app is still available for Android. But did imply in a statement to me the app hasn't violated its Play store policies yet. https://www.cnbc.com/... Steve Kovach / @stevekovach : On top of that, Apple put itself in a leadership position on this issue by taking a strong stand with its initial statement when it took down the podcast. Rest of the industry followed. Very strange it's ignoring requests to explain why it's keeping the app. https://twitter.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
The chart spike is a direct byproduct of Apple's removal of five Infowars podcasts, which triggered a cascade — Stitcher, Spotify, YouTube and Facebook had already pulled content, but Apple's move is what pushed the rest of the industry to act. The app itself stayed live because Apple judged it compliant with App Store guidelines even as the podcasts violated hate speech rules, per the company's own explanation of the split decision.
The result is a paradox worth tracking: enforcement made the product more visible, lifting it from 47th to 4th in the US iOS news category while it also topped Google Play trending — even though Google left the app up on its own policy grounds. The audience math cuts the other way, since losing Facebook and YouTube distribution likely shrinks total reach even as core fans consolidate into the app.
First-order effects
- Infowars gets a short-term visibility windfall: ban-driven news coverage converts casual readers into app downloads, and Alex Jones is simultaneously urging those fans to fight back and send money.
- Apple faces an immediate consistency problem — its own rationale for keeping the app while killing the podcasts becomes untenable once the app's chart rank makes the gap impossible to ignore.
Second-order effects
- Facebook's timing exposes the dependency chain: reporting shows Zuckerberg finally decided to remove Infowars after seeing news of Apple's podcast removals, confirming that platforms calibrate moderation to each other rather than to independent standards.
- Google is forced into a defensive posture on the Play Store, holding the line that the app violates no policy while absorbing pressure created entirely by Apple's and Facebook's moves.
Third-order effects
- As Max Read observed, only megaplatforms have the power to compel other megaplatforms — content moderation is converging on Apple as de facto first mover, with every other platform's policy effectively downstream of Cupertino's.
- The pattern points toward enforcement whiplash as structural: bans generate attention that rewards the banned party, pushing platforms toward escalating, permanent measures — which is where this ended, with Apple permanently banning the Infowars app a month later.
The trend: Platform moderation is consolidating around a single first-mover standard, where one megaplatform's enforcement decision cascades through the industry faster than any individual policy process.