Michael James Lindell (born June 28, 1961), also known as My Pillow Guy, is an American businessman, conservative political activist, and conspiracy theorist. He is the founder and CEO of My Pillow, Inc. , a manufacturer of pillows, bedding and slippers.
Lindell is a prominent supporter and advisor to former US President Donald Trump. After Trump was defeated in the 2020 presidential election, Lendl played an important role in supporting and financing Trump’s attempts to overturn the election result; Spreading false conspiracy theories about widespread electoral fraud in those elections. It has also been an active promoter of the toxic oleandin plant extract, as an alternative medical treatment for COVID-19.
Vocl/Frank website
In March 2021, media reported that Lindell was launching an alt-tech social media platform, which he described as a cross between YouTube and Twitter, that would be different from Gab and Parler. Originally called “Vocl,” a dispute from a company that owned a web site called “Vocal” led Lindell to rename his site “Frank”.Frank launched on April 19, 2021, experiencing many technical issues which Lindell ascribed to a “massive attack”. Frank has no social networking features and primarily offers embedded video streams, including Absolute Interference, a two-hour video promoting conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election.
Lindell has said he has spent millions of dollars developing Frank. According to invoices published by a Salon writer, obtained from a leaked video conference with Lindell’s IT team, Lindell spent about $936,000 on hardware, labor, and services to launch Frank. Jared Holt, an extremism and far-right media researcher at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab opined that Lindell was “being had by the people around him… All the various products and ventures Lindell has going on, whether it’s a pseudo-documentary film or a social media platform, are very expensive endeavors. Someone is taking Lindell’s money from him to produce this stuff.”
On April 28, Lindell told Steve Bannon on a podcast that Frank would launch again at a rally at the Corn Palace on May 10, 2021. The rally filled about half of the Corn Palace’s 3,000-person capacity and did not include any substantive announcements about Frank, which continues to lack social networking features.
Frank, based on its error messages, is written in Drupal. Several Drupal experts have criticized the way in which Frank was developed and deployed, including one who observed that Drupal is not designed to handle a large amount of user-generated content typically found on social media sites. One journalist observed that Frank was using Amazon Web Services for video hosting despite Lindell’s frequent criticism of “Big Tech
My Pillow
Lindell invented the My Pillow pillow in 2004 and grew the business into a major Minnesota manufacturing company.
In 2017, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) revoked accreditation of My Pillow, lowering its rating to an F based on a pattern of complaints by consumers. The BBB cited a buy one, get one free offer that became a continuous offer and therefore the normal price of the product, not a sale price or free offer. In a statement, Lindell said, “Naturally, I am terribly disappointed by the BBB’s decision.”
Mike Lindell says he still plans to launch his own social media site, 9 months after his first attempt crashed and burned
In 2020, Lindell named his son Darren as the company’s chief operating officer, citing his own possible future political ambitions.
In 2021, some major retailers stopped carrying My Pillow products. Lindell has suggested that this is a result of his claims relating to the 2020 United States presidential election results, although outlets like Kohl’s and Bed Bath & Beyond have stated this is due to market research and low customer demand.
Lindell told Zachary Petrizzo of The Daily Beast that he is waiting for approval for his social media app and won’t say exactly when the platform will launch.
Lendl, a close ally of former President Donald Trump and a supporter of voter fraud conspiracy theories about the presidential election, announced plans last March to launch his own social media site after it was blocked by Twitter. He said he spent “millions of dollars” building the site.
But it was hit with multiple delays, technical problems, and what Lendl claimed was “the biggest attack ever”. Frank Speech eventually launched in April, but it didn’t live up to expectations, launching as a one-way channel featuring videos, articles, and live broadcasts. The site largely focuses on conspiracy theories related to voter fraud, and Lendl recently uploaded a video of him interviewing Trump.
But Lendl’s comments on The Daily Beast show he still plans to add a side of social media to Frank Speech, which Lendl previously described as “a mix between YouTube and Twitter”.
When asked by The Daily Beast what competition he might face from Trump’s upcoming social media platform, Lindell said people could join in on both. Trump’s site, Truth Social, appears to be similar to Twitter and is due to launch in February.
“I would welcome 20 platforms if you get rid of the evil and corrupt Facebook and Twitter,” Lindell told The Daily Beast.
MyPillow did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider that was sent outside normal business hours.
For more information visit official website https://www.mypillow.com/