The story so far: Since Elon Musk’s takeover, Twitter has been roiling. The social media company’s workforce has dropped from nearly 8,000 to around 1,000. Alongside the drop, technical glitches and outages have increased.
Separately, as the blue tick verification and API access become paid features, several users are searching for alternative social media platforms. Though the decentralised Mastodon emerged as an early contender, Bluesky has come to the fore as a potential claimant to Twitter’s throne.
What is Bluesky?
Bluesky is a micro-blogging platform and social web built on the AT Protocol (Authenticated Transport Protocol). Bluesky might be classified as a Twitter competitor due to its founding team but is different in terms of its structure, as it is meant to form part of a decentralised ecosystem. Users of apps built on the AT Protocol would be able to move between platforms without losing their followers, media, work, and data. This account portability, as the feature is called, is a major part of the AT Protocol’s structure.
Bluesky says its founding mission is to “develop and drive large-scale adoption of technologies for open and decentralized public conversation.”
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Who is behind Bluesky?
The CEO of Bluesky is Jay Graber, a software engineer with a background in cryptocurrency. Bluesky was launched in 2019 by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, who chose Ms. Graber to lead the project. Twitter and Bluesky were meant to eventually connect and work with each other, but the companies ended their service agreement last year. Since then, Mr. Dorsey has admitted that mistakes were made in how Twitter handled certain content moderation debates.
Could Bluesky replace Twitter?
Not anytime soon. Bluesky is currently in private beta, meaning that only a select group has been allowed to join via invite codes. Others interested in trying it out can add themselves to a waitlist. Regular Bluesky members are also given a new invite code at periodic intervals that they can share with new applicants they deem trustworthy.
Bluesky said it had more than 50,000 users at the end of April but maintained that it would distribute invites at its own discretion to maintain the integrity of the platform. Based on this announcement, it is unlikely that Bluesky will replace Twitter any time soon, as it continues to grow its membership at a highly controlled rate.
What is it like on Bluesky?
Screenshots of Bluesky profiles retweeted by its CEO show a user interface similar to Twitter, with options to comment, share, or “heart” posts.
Celebrity users appear to be seeing fewer “likes” and “shares” when compared to their Twitter platforms, due to the smaller number of participants on Bluesky. Platform users also have the ability to set their domains as their handle, making it easier to link their accounts across ecosystems, and authenticate their identity.
While Bluesky aims to achieve a more decentralised structure, it is currently being regulated by an official team and is hosted on a single server, according to tech outlet The Verge.
How will content be moderated?
The new social media platform has defended its invite code sign-up process, claiming that it is easier to restrict sign-ups than clean up network abuse after quickly letting in a large number of users.
On its website, Bluesky says that it will follow automated filtering, manual admin actions, and community labelling to moderate content. Users will be able to add labels to posts based on their own values, and other users can also adopt these, if they wish to do so.
Even so, Bluesky encountered one of its first challenges with content moderation when users targeting the posts of a controversial Bluesky member discovered that the block function was not yet available. This was later added.
Users spreading hate or bullying others have also been banned from the platform.
How is Bluesky different from Mastodon?
While Bluesky and Mastodon both strive to be decentralised social media platforms, Bluesky is still highly controlled by its team of creators, and entry is based on an invite code. On the other hand, Mastodon has multiple servers that users can join or apply to join, making it less controlled in terms of entry.
Mastodon is also older, going back to 2016. Its servers saw over 2.5 million active users late last year and its popularity surged after Twitter came under Mr. Musk’s leadership. However, Mastodon’s active users soon dropped to less than two million, reported The Guardian. Complaints included the fact that Mastodon’s multiple server structure confused users, and that it lacked a significant user base. Meanwhile, Bluesky is newer and opting for a more regimented release of its product.
- Bluesky is a micro-blogging platform and social web built on the AT Protocol (Authenticated Transport Protocol). Bluesky might be classified as a Twitter competitor due to its founding team but is different in terms of its structure, as it is meant to form part of a decentralised ecosystem.
- Bluesky is currently in private beta, meaning that only a select group has been allowed to join via invite codes. Others interested in trying it out can add themselves to a waitlist.
- Bluesky said it had more than 50,000 users at the end of April but maintained that it would distribute invites at its own discretion to maintain the integrity of the platform. Based on this announcement, it is unlikely that Bluesky will replace Twitter any time soon, as it continues to grow its membership at a highly controlled rate.
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