Is the grass greener on the other side? We’re not sure, but the sky is definitely bluer. It’s been over a year since Elon Musk announced his bid to buy Twitter, and those opposed to the sale have tried to pitch in on platforms like Mastodon, Substack Notes, T2… but none of These Twitter alternatives have really captured lightning in a bottle like Blue Sky.
Bluesky is still invite-only in its beta version, but as more people get on the site, the hype around it is growing, although as we know from apps like Clubhouse, the hype may not last for always. Bluesky, meanwhile, now has about 50,000 users, but data.ai estimates the app has been downloaded more than 375,000 times. There are so many people trying to get an invite that they have started going up for sale on eBay (we don’t recommend making this purchase).
Here we answer the most common questions about Bluesky social:
What is Bluesky?
Bluesky is a decentralized social application conceptualized by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and developed alongside Twitter. The social network has a Twitter-like user interface with algorithmic selection, a federated design, and community-specific moderation.
Bluesky is using an open source framework built internally, the AT protocol, which means people outside the company have transparency into how it’s built and what’s being developed.
Dorsey introduced Project Bluesky in 2019 while still CEO of Twitter. At the time, he said Twitter would fund a “small independent team of up to five open source architects, engineers and designers” to build a decentralized standard for social media, with the original goal of Twitter adopting that standard . . But that was before Elon Musk bought the platform, so by the end of 2022, Bluesky is completely divorced from Twitter. Dorsey has even used Bluesky to express his dismay at Musk’s leadership.
Twitter is funding a small independent team of up to five open source architects, engineers and designers to develop an open, decentralized standard for social networking. The goal is for Twitter to eventually be a client of this standard. 🧵
— jack (@jack) December 11, 2019
How do you use Bluesky?
Once invited, users create an ID that is represented as @username.bsky.social, as well as a display name that appears more prominently in bold. If you’re so inclined, you can convert a domain name you own into your username; so, for example, TechCrunch’s Darrell Etherington is known on Bluesky as @etherington.com.
The app itself works like a simple Twitter, where you can click one more button to create a 256-character post, which can also include photos. The posts themselves can be replied to, retweeted, liked and, from a three-dot menu, reported, shared via the iOS Share Sheet to other apps, or copied as text
You can search and follow other people, then see their updates on your “Home” timeline. There’s also a “What’s Hot” timeline, which shows hot posts. User profiles contain the same kind of features you’d expect: a profile photo, background, bio and metrics, and how many people they follow. Profile feeds are divided into two sections, like Twitter: Posts and Posts and Replies.
There’s also a “Discover” tab at the bottom center of the app’s navigation that offers more “who to follow” suggestions and a running feed of recently released Bluesky updates.
Image credits: Natalie Christman
How do I get invited to Bluesky?
New users receive an invitation code every two weeks they are in the Bluesky app. The company monitors the social graph, giving users who invite trusted participants more invite codes to share.
Longer term, Bluesky says he sees the invite code system as one piece of the open source toolkit he’s building to help server administrators curate and moderate their communities.
Who’s in Bluesky?
By the end of April 2023, Bluesky reached 50,000 platform users. Notable personalities and organizations from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) to Twitter exile NPR have found a new home on Bluesky.
Does Bluesky work the same as Twitter?
In many ways, yes. However, Bluesky still lacks direct messages and some advanced tools like adding accounts to lists. Also, Twitter does not use a decentralized protocol like ActivityPub or AT.
Bluesky was initially started as a project convened by Jack Dorsey in 2019 when he was CEO of Twitter. But the social app has been an independent company since its inception in 2021.
Is bluesky free?
Yes, but access is currently by invitation only.
Is Bluesky decentralized?
Yes. The Bluesky team is developing the decentralized AT protocol, on which Bluesky was built. . In its beta phase, users can only join the bsky.social network, but Bluesky plans to be federated, meaning infinite individually operated communities can exist on the open source network. Therefore, if a developer outside of Bluesky created their own new social app using the AT protocol, Bluesky users could switch to the new app and carry over their existing followers, handle and data.
Is Bluesky on iOS and Android?
Yes. Bluesky was released to Android users on April 20 and initially rolled out to iOS users in late February. The platform doesn’t technically have a web app yet, but if you’re logged in and go to staging.bsky.app, it opens up a whole new world.
Are Bluesky posts really called “skeets”?
There is technically no name for the posts, but Internet users have adopted the name “skeets,” a portmanteau of “tweet” and “sky.” Users still widely refer to the posts as “skeets,” despite protests from Bluesky CEO Jay Graber and others who don’t find the semen slang funny.
Why are people posting about the “hell thread”?
Oh, the infernal thread. You had to be there. Basically too many people replied to a thread, everyone in the thread notifications broke, the post became unmuteable, the thread split into a bunch of different subthreads… It was chaos and the developer who could fix it was off until monday as it was the weekend, and he rightly stayed and took the days off, especially since he had just been working tirelessly to get the blog feature working. Oh, the joy of small startup teams! But that meant the infernal thread proliferated throughout the weekend. As noted shit poster June wrote, “so far on day 3 of the hell thread I’ve seen nudity, a game of tic tac toe, love found, what the hell thread can’t do hell”.
If you reply to the hell thread, you get stuck in the hell thread, meaning you start getting all the notifications, but you can’t scroll all the way up to see the whole hell thread, which which makes it a bit confusing, and also how do you know if you’re on the main hell thread or a sub thread? It’s easier to conceptualize the hell thread if you imagine it more like a hell tree, with roots and branches of varying sizes and strength.
To paraphrase Bluesky CEO Jay Graber, every bug that exists long enough becomes a feature.
Oh also, there was a duck bot that kept replying to the hell thread saying “😔🐥 No 💸 no qwack…”
What is the difference between Bluesky and Mastodon?
Although Bluesky’s architecture is similar to Mastodon’s, many users have found Bluesky to be more intuitive, while Mastodon can seem inaccessible: choosing which instance to join seems like an impossible task in Mastodon, and users of a long time they are very defensive about their established publishing rules. , which can make it intimidating to join the conversation. To remain competitive, Mastodon recently simplified its registration flow, making mastodon.social the default server for new users.
Who owns Bluesky?
Although Jack Dorsey funded Bluesky and sits on the company’s board of directors, he is not involved in day-to-day development. Bluesky’s CEO is Jay Graber, who previously worked as a software engineer for the cryptocurrency Zcash, then founded an event planning site called Happening.
If you have more Bluesky FAQs not covered here, leave us a comment below.
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Bluesky is an up and coming social media platform created by Ikaroa, a full stack tech company. It is an answer to the waning interest and concerns raised over Twitter and other current platforms. Bluesky aims to replace Twitter by filling the gap of communication that Twitter leaves unfilled by providing a cleaner and safer space for users to engage with one another.
The app is designed to be a more private, secure, and reliable platform. Bluesky seeks to guarantee the safety of its users by providing a secure platform for them. It also eliminates the risk of hate speech, fake news, and cyberbullying. To do this, Bluesky utilizes a filtering system to keep content in line with its community guidelines, as well as stronger user control options.
Bluesky also differentiates itself in the form of its features. One potential feature the platform is considering is the integration of voice messages. This would let users stay connected with each other even when they’re unable to type out messages. Bluesky also will have a personalised news section, where news stories and articles can be tailored to one’s personal interests.
Ikaroa are also introducing a new form of digital currency, called Skycoin. With Skycoin, users will be able to purchase items on Bluesky, as well as store and exchange it with other users. As its name implies, Skycoin hopes to take off in the near future and become the go-to currency of the digital world.
There’s no doubt that Bluesky holds great potential as the next wave of social media platform. With its innovative features and secure platform, it is poised to become the most trusted and used platform of the future. It offers not only the chance for a safer, more personalised experience, but also the opportunity for users to stay connected and to conduct transactions with each other. Ikaroa’s Bluesky is sure to make waves in the social media pool.
