ReaganBook: ‘The Facebook For Patriots’ Is Already Offline

ReaganBook, the conservative social networking site that recently pre-launched, has already been taken offline.

The website, which billed itself as “the Facebook for patriots,” looks to be temporarily down while it works out security issues. ReaganBook left users with this message:

Thank you to all those who participated in the pre-release of ReaganBook.com Your participation is helping us build a more secure site. Thank you! Please be patient while we make the necessary changes to keep the site free from obscenity, pornography, and those intent on the destruction of life, liberty, and the family. We will be opening the doors again soon with additional protections in place. As Reagan taught us, trust, but verify.

According to The Verge’s Colin Lecher, who joined the social network while it was still up, the site’s design was highly susceptible to trolls. The site did not require individuals to prove their identity and status updates could be viewed by anyone on the site, not just those you were friends with. This gave way to chaos.

“[E]veryone seems to be either using real names, the names of famous conservatives, or the names of famous conservatives paired with sex acts. Some are earnest; some are parody,” Lecher wrote.

Janet Porter, president of Faith2Action, started the website. She announced its pre-launch recently at the Ohio Liberty Coalition’s “Reload 4 Liberty” event. She said the site was built on the concept of freedom of speech. She wanted it to be a place where people could opine freely, unlike on Facebook, which Porter said censors “unpopular opinions.”

“We’re tearing down walls of tyranny and censorship,” she said.

According to The Verge, during the last few days that ReaganBook was online, Porter started apologizing for the “vile content” people were posting to the site.

Porter did not respond to TPM’s request for comment.