Is the grass greener next door? I'm not sure, but I'm sure the sky is bluer. It's been about two years since Elon Musk bought Twitter (now X) and people started setting up shop on alternative platforms. Mastodon, Post, Pebble (now defunct), and Spill have been mentioned as possible replacements, but apart from Meta's Threads, few companies have achieved the speed of growth that Bluesky achieved.
Bluesky was invite-only for almost a year, but became available to everyone in February 2024, gaining about 800,000 new users in a single day. As of October 2024, Bluesky has over 10 million users. This is thanks to an influx of users after X was banned in Brazil and an influx of users following the updated X policy that helped the app skyrocket to the top five apps on the US App Store. While the numbers are encouraging, the network has a lot of catching up to do to compete with Threads' 175 million users in its first year.
What is Blue Sky?
Bluesky is a decentralized social app conceptualized by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and developed in parallel with Twitter. This social network features a Twitter-like user interface with algorithmic selection, federated design, and community-specific moderation.
Bluesky uses the AT protocol, an open source framework built in-house. This means that people outside the company are transparent about how the framework is built and what is being developed.
Dorsey introduced the Bluesky project in 2019, when he was still Twitter CEO. At the time, he said Twitter would fund “a small, independent team of up to five open source architects, engineers, and designers” responsible for building decentralized standards for social media, adding that He said the goal is for Twitter itself to adopt this standard. . But that was before Elon Musk bought the platform, and Bluesky divorced from Twitter for good.
As of May 2024, Mr. Dorsey is no longer a member of BlueSky's board of directors. Bluesky is now an independent public benefit corporation led by CEO Jay Graber.
How do I use Blue Sky?
When signing up, users can create a handle, represented as @username.bsky.social, and a display name, which is displayed prominently in bold. If you feel like it, you can turn your domain name into your username. So, for example, I'm known as @amanda.omg.lol on Bluesky.
The app itself functions a lot like basic Twitter, with the plus button allowing you to create 256-character posts. Posts can also include photos. The post itself can be replied to, retweeted, liked, reported from the Miscellaneous menu, shared to other apps via the iOS share sheet, or copied as text.
Search for and follow others to see their latest updates on your Home timeline. Previously, the Bluesky app featured popular posts in the “What's Hot” feed. This feed has since been replaced with the algorithmically personalized Discover feed, which does more than just trending content.
Bluesky has introduced a “Starter Pack” feature for new users. It creates a curated list of people to follow and custom feeds to quickly find interesting content.
Your user profile includes the same types of features you'd expect, including your profile photo, background, profile, metrics, and the number of people you follow. Your profile feed is divided into two sections, similar to Twitter: Posts and Posts and Replies.
There's also a Discover tab at the bottom center of the app's navigation, offering more Who to Follow suggestions and a running feed of recently posted Bluesky updates.
Image credit: Natalie Christman
Who is in Blue Sky?
By early July 2023, when Instagram Threads launched, Bluesky had surpassed 1 million downloads across iOS and Android. Notable names such as Neil Gaiman, Drill, and Chelsea Manning have moved to Blue Sky. It is also home to news organizations such as Bloomberg, The Washington Post, and Engadget. Starting in August 2024, Bluesky will allow heads of state to sign up and participate on the platform for the first time.
Does Bluesky work the same way as X?
In many ways, yes. Until recently, Bluesky didn't have DM like X, but it has since been implemented. However, Bluesky's DMs are currently limited to one-on-one messages rather than group messages. Bluesky also said he is interested in implementing something similar to X's community notes feature. Additionally, X does not use decentralized protocols like ActivityPub or AT.
In October 2024, Elon Musk announced that the blocking feature in X would work differently. The new blocking feature allows blocked users to see your posts and profile, but they can't interact with your posts. Some users believe this update is a safety concern and its blocking feature is more traditional, leading to a rush to sign up for Bluesky.
Bluesky originally started as a project convened by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey in 2019, but the social app has been an independent company since its founding in 2021.
Is Blue Sky free?
Yes, it is currently open to the public.
How does Blue Sky make money?
Bluesky's goal is to find other means to sustain the network outside of advertising through paid services, and to remain free for end users. On July 5, 2023, Bluesky announced additional seed round funding and a paid service offering custom domains to end users who want their own domain as a handle for the service. BlueSky also emphasized that monetizing the platform “doesn't require selling user data for advertising.”
Is Bluesky decentralized?
yes. Bluesky's team is developing a decentralized AT protocol that Bluesky is built on top of. In the beta phase, users can only join the bsky.social network, but Bluesky will be federated. This means that an infinite number of independently operated communities can exist within an open source network. So, if a developer other than Bluesky builds their own new social app using the AT protocol, Bluesky users can jump to the new app and port their existing followers, handles, and data over.
“Rather than being bound to the whims and black-box algorithms of a private company, you have the freedom to choose (and back out) at any time. And wherever you go, your friends and relationships will be there, too,” Bluesky's blog post said. I explained.
Is Blue Sky safe?
In October 2023, Bluesky added email authentication as part of a larger effort to improve the security and authentication of accounts on its network. This addition is an important step forward in making Bluesky more competitive against larger networks like X with more robust security controls. Following backlash from users, Bluesky in December 2023 allowed users to opt out of changes that exposed posts to the public web.
Is Bluesky customizable?
yes. In May 2023, Bluesky released a custom algorithm it calls “Custom Feed.” Custom feeds allow users to subscribe to multiple different algorithms that showcase different types of posts that users want to see. You can pin custom feeds that appear at the top of your timeline as different tabs to choose from. Pinned or saved feeds can be found in the app's sidebar under the “My Feeds” menu.
In March 2024, the company announced AT Protocol Grants, a new program that provides small grants to developers to encourage growth and customization. One recipient, SkyFeed, is a custom tool that allows anyone to create their own feed using a graphical user interface.
Is Bluesky available on iOS and Android?
yes. Bluesky was rolled out to Android users on April 20th and was initially rolled out to iOS users in late February. Users can access Bluesky on the web here.
How does Blue Sky deal with misinformation?
After the October 2023 update, the app will now flag misleading links and warn users. If a link shared in a user's post doesn't match its text, the app will show the user a “potentially misleading” warning that the link may be leading the user somewhere they don't want to go. Warn you that there is.
Image credit: Bluesky on Github Image credit: Bluesky on Github
Has Blue Sky had any controversy?
Bluesky has been plagued by moderation issues since its initial launch. The app has been criticized for failing to protect marginalized users and moderating racist content. Following controversy over app allowing racial slurs on account handles, disgruntled users launch 'posting strike' to flag slurs and other offensive terms in usernames refused to engage with the platform until guardrails were established.
What moderation features does Bluesky have?
A December 2023 post from the Bluesky Safety account announced a slew of moderation updates.
Bluesky is rolling out “more sophisticated automated tools” designed to flag content that violates its community guidelines, which will be reviewed by the app's moderation team.
Bluesky has launched moderation features similar to those in X, including user lists and moderation lists. The latter can be used to mute or block many users at once. The app is also working on a feature that will allow users to limit who can reply to their posts.
Some Bluesky users still insist on the ability to set their accounts private. The need for this feature has increased since Bluesky announced the launch of a public web interface.
In March 2024, the company launched Ozone, a tool that allows users to create and run their own independent moderation services that give them “unprecedented control” over their social media experiences.
What is the difference between Blue Sky and Mastodon?
Bluesky's architecture is similar to that of Mastodon, but many users find Bluesky more intuitive, while Mastodon may seem less accessible. Mastodon makes choosing which instances to participate feel like an impossible task, and long-time users are very defensive about established posting standards. , it can be scary to participate in the conversation. To stay competitive, Mastodon recently simplified its sign-up flow and made mastodon.social the default server for new users.
However, starting a federation makes it behave more like Mastodon in that users can choose which servers to join and move their accounts around freely.
Who owns Blue Sky?
Although Jack Dorsey provided funding to Bluesky, he is not involved in day-to-day development and is not currently a member of the company's board of directors. Bluesky's CEO is Jay Graber, who previously worked as a software engineer for the cryptocurrency Zcash and went on to found an event planning site called Happening.
If you have any FAQs about Bluesky that aren't covered here, please leave a comment below.