Is the grass greener on the opposite facet? We’re unsure, however the sky is most definitely bluer. It’s been two years since Elon Musk bought Twitter, now X, main folks to arrange store on various platforms. Mastodon, Put up, Pebble (two of which have already shuttered operations) and Spill have been offered as potential replacements, however few except for Meta’s Threads have achieved the pace of progress Bluesky has reached.
After being invite-only for nearly a 12 months, Bluesky turned open to anybody in February 2024 and gained nearly 800,000 new customers in a day. As of November 2024, Bluesky has over 14.5 million customers. Its progress stems from a number of coverage adjustments at X, together with a closely criticized change to the block characteristic and permitting third get together firms to practice their AI on customers’ posts, which helped the app soar into the highest 5 apps within the U.S. App Retailer. Bluesky additionally noticed a giant enhance following the outcomes of the 2024 U.S. presidential election (which additionally contributed to an X exodus by Taylor Swift followers). However whereas the quantity is promising, the community has loads of catching as much as do to compete with Threads’ 275 million month-to-month energetic customers.
What’s Bluesky?
Bluesky is a decentralized social app conceptualized by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and developed in parallel with Twitter. The social community has a Twitter-like person interface with algorithmic alternative, a federated design and community-specific moderation.
Bluesky is utilizing an open supply framework constructed in-house, the AT Protocol, that means folks exterior of the corporate have transparency into how it’s constructed and what’s being developed.
Dorsey launched the Bluesky undertaking again in 2019 whereas he was nonetheless Twitter CEO. On the time, he mentioned Twitter can be funding a “small independent team of up to five open source architects, engineers, and designers,” charged with constructing a decentralized commonplace for social media, with the unique objective that Twitter would undertake this commonplace itself. However that was earlier than Elon Musk purchased the platform, so Bluesky is totally divorced from Twitter.
As of Could 2024, Dorsey is not on Bluesky’s board. Bluesky is now an unbiased public profit company led by CEO Jay Graber.
How do you employ Bluesky?
Upon signing up, customers can create a deal with which is then represented as @username.bsky.social in addition to a show title that seems extra distinguished in daring textual content. When you’re so inclined, you’ll be able to flip a website title that you just personal into your username — so, for instance, I’m identified on Bluesky as @amanda.omg.lol.
The app itself features very similar to a bare-bones Twitter, the place you’ll be able to click on a plus button to create a submit of 256 characters, which might additionally embody photographs. Posts themselves will be replied to, retweeted, favored and, from a three-dot menu, reported, shared by way of the iOS Share Sheet to different apps, or copied as textual content.
You possibly can seek for and comply with different people, then view their updates in your “Home” timeline. Beforehand, the Bluesky app would characteristic widespread posts in a “What’s Hot” feed. That feed has since been changed with an algorithmic and customized “Discover” feed that includes extra than simply trending content material.
For brand new customers, Bluesky launched a “Starter Pack” characteristic, which creates a curated listing of individuals and customized feeds to comply with as a way to discover fascinating content material proper out of the gate.
Person profiles comprise the identical type of options you’d anticipate: a profile pic, background, bio, metrics and the way many individuals they’re following. Profile feeds are divided into two sections, like Twitter: posts and posts & replies.
There’s additionally a “Discover” tab within the backside middle of the app’s navigation, which provides extra “who to follow” solutions and a operating feed of just lately posted Bluesky updates.
Who’s on Bluesky?
By the start of July 2023, when Instagram’s Threads launched, Bluesky topped one million downloads throughout iOS and Android. Notable figures like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Mark Cuban, Dril, Bizarre Al Yankovic, and even Brazil President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva have migrated to Bluesky. It’s additionally house to information organizations like Bloomberg, The Washington Put up, and naturally, TechCrunch! Since August 2024, Bluesky can be now permitting heads of state to enroll and be part of the platform for the primary time.
Does Bluesky work identical to X?
In some ways, sure. Up till just lately, Bluesky didn’t have DMs like X, however that has since been applied. Nevertheless, DMs on Bluesky are at present restricted to one-to-one messages, not group messages. Bluesky has additionally mentioned it’s all in favour of implementing one thing just like X’s Group Notes characteristic. Moreover, X doesn’t use a decentralized protocol like ActivityPub or AT.
In October 2024, Elon Musk introduced that X’s block characteristic would work in another way than it has previously. The brand new block performance permits customers you might have blocked to view your posts and your profile, however not the flexibility to work together together with your posts. Some customers consider this replace to be a security concern, resulting in an inflow in Bluesky sign-ups as its block characteristic is extra conventional.
Whereas Bluesky was initially kicked off as a undertaking convened by Jack Dorsey in 2019 when he was CEO of Twitter, the social app has been an unbiased firm since its inception in 2021.
Is Bluesky free?
Sure, and it’s now open to the general public.
How does Bluesky generate income?
Bluesky’s objective is to search out one other means to maintain its community exterior of promoting with paid companies, so it will possibly stay free to finish customers. On July 5, 2023, Bluesky introduced further seed spherical funding and a paid service that gives customized domains for finish customers who need to have a novel area as their deal with on the service. Bluesky has additionally emphasised that it doesn’t need to “require selling user data for ads” as a way to monetize its platform.
In November 2024, Bluesky introduced it raised a $15 million Collection A spherical and is growing a subscription service for premium options like “higher quality video uploads or profile customizations.” Bluesky, nevertheless, famous its subscription mannequin is not going to comply with within the footsteps of X’s “pay to win” premium choices.
Is Bluesky decentralized?
Sure. Bluesky’s group is growing the decentralized AT Protocol, which Bluesky was constructed atop. In its beta section, customers can solely be part of the bsky.social community, however Bluesky plans to be federated, that means that countless individually operated communities can exist throughout the open supply community. So, if a developer exterior of Bluesky constructed their very own new social app utilizing the AT Protocol, Bluesky customers might leap over to the brand new app and port over their current followers, deal with and information.
“You’ll always have the freedom to choose (and to exit) instead of being held to the whims of private companies or black box algorithms. And wherever you go, your friends and relationships will be there too,” a Bluesky weblog submit defined.
Is Bluesky safe?
In October 2023, Bluesky added e-mail verification as half of a bigger effort to enhance account safety and authentication on the community. The addition is a crucial step ahead by way of making Bluesky extra aggressive with bigger networks like X, which have extra strong safety controls. In December 2023, Bluesky allowed customers to decide out of a change that might expose their posts to the general public internet following backlash from customers.
Is Bluesky customizable?
Sure. In Could 2023, Bluesky launched customized algorithms, which it calls “custom feeds.” Customized feeds permit customers to subscribe to a number of completely different algorithms that showcase completely different sorts of posts a person could need to see. You possibly can pin customized feeds that may present up on the high of your timeline as completely different tabs to select from. The feeds you pin, or save, are positioned below the “My Feeds” menu within the app’s sidebar.
In March 2024, the corporate introduced “AT Protocol Grants,” a brand new program that may dole out small grants to builders as a way to foster progress and customization. One of many recipients, SkyFeed, is a customized device that lets anybody construct their very own feeds utilizing a graphical person interface.
Is Bluesky on iOS and Android?
Sure. Bluesky rolled out to Android customers on April 20 and was initially launched to iOS customers in late February. Customers can entry Bluesky on the net right here.
How does Bluesky deal with misinformation?
After an October 2023 replace, the app will now warn customers of deceptive hyperlinks by flagging them. If hyperlinks shared in customers’ posts don’t match their textual content, the app will supply a “possibly misleading” warning to the person to alert them that the hyperlink could also be directing them someplace they don’t need to go.
Has Bluesky had any controversies?
Bluesky has been embattled with moderation points since its first launch. The app has been accused of failing to guard its marginalized customers and failing to average racist content material. Following an argument concerning the app permitting racial slurs in account handles, annoyed customers initiated a “posting strike,” the place they refused to have interaction with the platform till it established guardrails to flag slurs and different offensive phrases in usernames.
What moderation options does Bluesky have?
A December 2023 submit from the Bluesky Security account introduced a big batch of moderation updates.
Bluesky is rolling out “more advanced automated tooling” designed to flag content material that violates its Group Tips that may then be reviewed by the app’s moderation group.
Bluesky launched moderation options just like ones on X, together with person lists and moderation lists, the latter of which can be utilized to mute or block many customers directly. The app can be growing a characteristic that lets customers restrict who can reply to posts.
Some Bluesky customers are nonetheless advocating for the flexibility to set their accounts to non-public — a characteristic they’ve an elevated want for after Bluesky introduced it will launch a public internet interface.
In March 2024, the corporate launched Ozone, a device that lets customers create and run their very own unbiased moderation companies that may give customers “unprecedented control” over their social media expertise.
What’s the distinction between Bluesky and Mastodon?
Although Bluesky’s structure is just like Mastodon’s, many customers have discovered Bluesky to be extra intuitive, whereas Mastodon can come off as inaccessible: Selecting which occasion to hitch looks like an inconceivable job on Mastodon, and longtime customers are very defensive about their established posting norms, which might make becoming a member of the dialog intimidating. To stay aggressive, Mastodon just lately simplified its sign-up stream, making mastodon.social the default server for brand new customers.
Nevertheless, the launch of federation will make it work extra equally to Mastodon in that customers can decide and select which servers to hitch and transfer their accounts round at will.
Who owns Bluesky?
Although Jack Dorsey funded Bluesky, he’s not concerned in day-to-day improvement and not sits on the corporate’s board. The CEO of Bluesky is Jay Graber, who beforehand labored as a software program engineer for the cryptocurrency Zcash, then based an event-planning website known as Taking place.
In case you have extra FAQs about Bluesky not coated right here, depart us a remark beneath.
