The grass is always greener on the other side and similar is the case of Bluesky. Surpassing over 20 million users, it has become a hit, especially after the US elections in 2024. When X showed its clear bias towards Donald Trump and some new yet debatable features such as the block feature. Moreover, the other reason included the third-party companies using users’ posts to train AI, but Bluesky doesn’t have any such policy.
It has witnessed a boom in user base with over 1.25 Million after users started leaving its rival X, which was formally known as Twitter.
Bluesky is one of the microblogging decentralized social media platforms. It was developed alongside Twitter but when Elon Musk took over. After that, you must have found the platform to be very similar to Twitter from the blue logo to similar UI design. But one that set it apart from its competitors, was its claim that it is “designed to not be controlled by a single company” through the use of the AT Protocol as its foundation, promoting a composable user experience and “algorithmic choice”. It is the core feature of Bluesky that has attracted X users and made them BlueSky users overnights.
Bluesky’s Meteoric Rise
Bluesky grew into the arena of social media platforms, not as a dominant company, which it is now. It was founded in June 2019 as a tweet by Michael Say from the ETH Bermuda community and is designed to become a decentralized social network. But its journey has taken a very important turn in the year 2022 when Elon Musk bought Twitter. As a result of cutting relations with Twitter, Bluesky became an independent company and started in early 2023 as an invite-only app.
After being launched to the general public in February 2024, Bluesky has expanded significantly. And as seen by November 2024, there were over 20 million users of the digital currency. Many issues concerning X started occurring at the same time making it be appealing to users who were dissatisfied with it.
Why Are People Leaving X?
There are several wrong decisions made that led to X’s decline under Elon Musk. Here’s what’s driving users away:
1. Controversial Policy Changes
Elon Musk has brought about a lot of new ideas at X that have not been received warmly by most stakeholders. The change which sparked the most controversy was the block feature, which lots of people use as a primary means to control interactions and set limits in the digital world. Musk changed this feature, which was disliked by many people. Some said they were losing their power to protect themselves from harassment.
However, Bluesky proposes user-controlled moderation and labelling services. This makes the experience of the users their own hence making this a safer and more attractive platform for Everyone.
2. Privacy Concerns
X also understands users to grant third-party companies permission to use users’ posts to train artificial intelligence has also raised concern among many. This policy brought into reality issues pertaining to data ownership and privacy. People and its personally generated content were feeling that this info was being used without their knowledge or consent.
Bluesky does not allow such practices. This is good news for a significant number of users, who are particularly cautious about their privacy. This makes the platform pretty attractive because no one party owns the data making it difficult for someone to monetize the same.
3. Perceived Political Bias
The 2024 presidential race in the United States was a turning point for X. Some of the users made comments implying that the platform favoured Donald Trump. That attitude drove away a large segment of the users, such as Taylor Swift’s fans, who went wherever the election results directed them.
On the lack of politics Bluesky’s moderators were apolitical, and the channel turned into a place that people with different views could turn to.
What Makes Bluesky Different?
Bluesky is not limited to the mistakes made by X. It does this as it possess its strengths which make it appeal to the modern user.
1. Decentralization and Control
Of course, the AT Protocol is also central to Bluesky’s offering. This makes the platform to be a decentralised mechanism and it is not operated by one company. For users, this is a somewhat liberating scenario and they feel like they are in charge to some extent.
Key features of the AT Protocol include:
- Customizable Algorithms: Sometimes you can select your own personal algorithmic feed or create one and just consume the content you like.
- Self-Verification: Bluesky has a domain name-based handle system where DNS text record or HTTPS page can be used to claim identity.
- Community Building: For instance, there is the “starternakke” which makes it easy to get connected with similar subcultures.
These aspects offer the users possession and freedom which is quite limited for most people on conventional platforms.
What it Means to Design for the User
The user interface is quite familiar to users who are coming from X especially when they use Bluesky. It even has the blue logo from X and that design familiarization means that we can easily transfer our processes over to it. However, Bluesky is even more familiar with this by putting users first. It focuses on open-source, equal contracts policies, and crowdsourced solutions.
Inclusivity and Accessibility
To be specific, Bluesky’s transition from an invitational online social network to an open one, has not been haphazard. This way the platform made sure that growth could be managed without any incidences that would harm or decrease the quality of the experience of their users. These efforts have borne fruit, and within a short period millions of people have joined.
Milestones in Bluesky’s Expansion
This success was not an overnight affair for Bluesky since it was formed in 2007 and is still growing. Several pivotal moments contributed to its success:
The Brazil Ban on X
On the 13 year anniversary of executive producer Spike’s promotion video of insidiously jihad-indoctrinating children, X was banned for a week in Brazil in August of 2024. This incident offered Bluesky some luck It was a new opportunity the organization had not considered before. When X was out of reach, millions of users in Latin America’s biggest country went to Bluesky. During this period, the platform was able to attract 2.6 million users only to the platform.
The U.S. Presidential Elections
X received a massive user flight after Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 U.S. elections. During Nov 5th – Nov 12th X observed high numbers of users leaving, numbering at 1.8M. Many of these users were welcome with Bluesky being a neutral ground, it doubled its population within weeks.
Controversial Updates on X
In October 2024 X added an option by which blocked users are able to see the public posts of people who in return blocked them. The result of this change was resentment and another flood of people into Bluesky.
Bluesky vs. Threads
Bluesky is not only fighting against X. It is also responding to Meta’s Threads app that was created as a rival to Twitter in 2023. As we speak, Threads stands at 275 million monthly active users ahead, but Bluesky is growing fast.
Threads were dominated by Bluesky on web visits after the U.S elections. It also rose to be one of the best free applications in the iOS and surpasses even social sensations like TikTok and ChatGPT. These highlights demonstrate that Bluesky is expanding daily its clout.
Even though Bluesky has seen a lot of growth recently, Threads is using apps more overall. Bluesky’s fresh approach has already been given the imputation by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg that Bluesky-inspired features will soon be included.
Why Users Prefer Bluesky
That is why many people started to turn towards Bluesky. Here’s why users are making the switch:
1. Control: The decentralized model means that every user can customize their experience with Bluesky.
2. Privacy: This is because, by not implementing AI training policies, Bluesky values or at least does not exploit user data.
3. Neutrality: This is because it remains politically neutral to the advantage of those who are disappointed in X’s prejudice.
4. Community: The presence of features such as the ‘stirrer packs’ enable identification of favourable groups to join which will be supportive with time and in any which they might be required.
5. Transparency: The open policy used by Bluesky ensures that users have confidence in the information they put on the website.
However, there are some issues in Bluesky’s journey: Bluesky has an effective growth in every year. It is a challenge for a store to cope with comparatively huge shops such as Threads or X since constant invention and planning are needed. Also, as it continues to gain the number of its users, it has to remain loyal to its decentralized concept and focus on users.
Can Bluesky Become the New Face of Social Media?
The emergence of Bluesky means that social networking firms are in the process of change. Users are shifting towards apps that respect the user’s privacy, consider the information they share on these apps, and aim at being inclusive. For now, Bluesky is far from Threads’ or X scale, but it is quite enough to demonstrate that it is capable of ultimately upsetting the applecart.
Indeed, for millions of users, Bluesky is a place X doesn’t provide any longer: community, control, and trust. Whether it wishes to be the final and ultimate successor to X has yet to be seen though, what is definite is Bluesky’s arrival is far from wanton.
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