Jump to content

Bluesky

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Bsky.app)
"Bsky" redirects here. For the broadcasting company formerly known as BSkyB, see Sky UK.
For other uses, see Bluesky (disambiguation).

Bluesky
A simplified silhouette of a butterfly, with two symmetric pairs of wings, colored with a sky-blue gradient
Current logo used in Bluesky's interface branding, introduced December 2023
Web interface showing a user account on Bluesky. To the left, a list of different modes. In the center, a header and profile description above a feed with posts, threading, and embedded content. To the right, a list of user-selected custom feeds.
Screenshot of the Bluesky desktop interface, featuring the official company account, October 2024
Type of site
Social networking service
Available in19 languages[1]
Founded
Area servedWorldwide
OwnerBluesky Social, PBC[3]
URLbsky.app
RegistrationPublicly available since February 6, 2024. Previously invitation-only.[4]
Users
  • Increase 15.7 million total registered users (as of November 14, 2024)[5][6]
  • Increase 8 million MAU (as of November 14, 2024)[7]
Current statusActive

Bluesky[a] is a decentralized microblogging social networking service primarily operated by Bluesky Social, PBC.[8] It was created as a proof of concept for the AT Protocol, a communication protocol for decentralized social networks.[9][10] The platform is analogous to Twitter, where users can share short text posts, images, and video, and can like, repost, and reply to any given post.

Bluesky Social claims the social app was "designed to not be controlled by a single company" through the use of the AT Protocol as its foundation.[11] The company promotes a composable user experience and "algorithmic choice" as core features of Bluesky, offering a "marketplace of algorithms" where users can choose or create feeds to customize their experience.[12] Bluesky offers a DNS-based domain name handle system via the AT Protocol, allowing users to self-verify an account's legitimacy and identity by proving ownership of a domain name through the protocol.[13]

Bluesky was originally created as a research initiative in 2019 by then-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to investigate the possibility of decentralizing the platform.[14] This initiative resulted in the hiring of Jay Graber in August 2021 to lead the Bluesky project and the development of what is now the AT Protocol, with initial funding provided by Twitter.[15] After the acquisition of Twitter by Elon Musk, Twitter severed all legal and financial ties with Bluesky Social. This led to the rapid development of the Bluesky social app and the AT Protocol as a minimum viable product, launching as an invite-only beta in February 2023.[16][17][18] The social app opened registrations to the general public in February 2024.[19] Bluesky is considered a major competitor to Twitter, alongside Threads and Mastodon.[20][21]

Service history

[edit]
Graph showing an increase in the amount of registered users on Bluesky.
The total number of users on Bluesky increased from approximately 200,000 in July 2023 to over 5.9 million by July 2024, with a marked increase in early 2024.

Bluesky was described in 2021 as an initiative to develop what is now the AT Protocol, a decentralized social network protocol in which multiple social networks, each with its own systems of curation and moderation, interact with other social networks through an open standard. Each social network using the protocol would be called an "application".[8] As of 2024, Bluesky Social operates its own official network within the AT Protocol, Bluesky, a centralized service running on open-source software for its servers and client apps, with the initial protocol implementation released under the MIT license.[22] Neither the protocol nor service uses blockchain technology.[23][24] Frequent users have called posts on the platform "skeets",[25][26] which is a blend of "sky" and "tweets",[27] but also a slang word for ejaculation,[28][29][30] despite CEO Jay Graber pleading with users not to call them that.[31]

The Authenticated Data Experiment (ADX), in mid-2022, was Bluesky Social's first early protocol release. It used personal data repositories, intended to be controlled by individual users, that social networks would optionally support. The stated purpose was to let users post messages without necessarily affecting their visibility to other users, as primary storage of the data would remain in the personal data repository while networks would handle the distribution to other users.[32] The ATP FAQ[33] later described this distinction as a division between "speech" and "reach" layers.[34] Bluesky Social released a simplified version as the "AT Protocol" in October 2022, alongside technical documentation.[35]

Bluesky Social started a waitlist in October 2022 for a service that would use the protocol.[23] At the time of release, Bluesky Social only addressed interoperability and had not explained how it would address platform moderation and monetization.[35] In February 2023, the Bluesky app was released for iOS as an invitation-only beta, and the service was available only to users who had received an invitation code, either from the company or from an existing user. Reviewing the app, TechCrunch called it "a functional, if still rather bare-bones, Twitter-like experience."[36]

In April 2023, it was released for Android.[37][38] After the launch of the Android app, the social network reached about 50,000 users in April 2023.[39] The launch surfaced technical issues, including a bug that created incorrect notifications.[39] Bluesky Social was made open source under the MIT license in May 2023.[40] On May 26,[41] 2023, Bluesky launched a feature it called "Custom Feeds", with the goal of promoting algorithmic choice. Bluesky developer Paul Frazee stated that "In future updates [Bluesky] will make it easy for users to create custom feeds in-app."[42] Third-party tools to publish Custom Feeds on Bluesky have been created by independent developers, including a popular client named Skyfeed.[43]

In September 2023, Bluesky reached 1 million registered users,[44] and in November, it surpassed 2 million users.[45] In December 2023, Bluesky Social announced a new platform and company logo, which was also used as the icon for the official app and website. This icon was a blue butterfly, inspired by existing users' usage of the butterfly emoji to indicate their handles on the service. The launch of this new icon corresponded with the release of a public view for posts on the network, allowing those without accounts on the service to view its posts.[46]

Opening to general public

[edit]

The platform became open to all public registrations on 6 February 2024, when the previous invitation-only format was dropped.[19] It saw an influx of registrations by Japanese-speaking users, partly due to notable Japanese social media personalities such as artist Ui Shigure registering accounts there. The platform for a while had over six times more Japanese-language posts than English-language ones.[47]

On August 30, 2024, Brazilian Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes ordered the shutdown of X (Twitter) within the country after the company missed his deadline to appoint a legal representative for Brazil's investigation into Elon Musk.[48] As a result of the deadline and subsequent shutdown, Bluesky saw a large increase in signups, gaining over 4 million users in under two weeks and becoming the most popular app in the Brazilian App Store and Play Store.[49][50] As a result, on September 16, Bluesky announced it had crossed the mark of 10 million users.[51] On September 11, 2024, Bluesky began gradually rolling out video functionality to users after teasing the feature for months. Uploaded videos have a time limit of 60 seconds, and users can upload a maximum of 10GB or 25 videos a day to the platform.[52]

Following a decision made by X on October 16, 2024 to change how the block feature works, where blocked accounts can still see posts by users who blocked them if their profile is public, and a decision to update their Terms of Service so that users opt-in automatically to allow their data to be used for training generative AI projects, Bluesky announced that over 1.2 million users had joined within 2 days.[53][54][55] In November 2024, following allegations of election interference by Elon Musk during the 2024 United States presidential election through his control of X and his subsequent nomination as a co-executives of the proposed Department of Government Efficiency, a wave of users joined the platform with estimates of over 1 million users within a week and crossing 15 million active accounts.[56]

Bluesky Social

[edit]
Bluesky Social, PBC
Company typePublic benefit corporation
IndustrySocial media
FoundedOctober 4, 2021; 3 years ago (2021-10-04), in Wilmington, Delaware[3][57]
Key people
Products
Owner"Jay Graber and the Bluesky team"[2]
Websitebsky.social

Twitter's then-CEO Jack Dorsey first announced the Bluesky initiative in 2019 on Twitter.[59] The company's chief technology officer (and later CEO) Parag Agrawal was its manager,[23] inviting initial working group members in early 2020. The group expanded with representatives from existing decentralized networks Mastodon and ActivityPub. The group coordinated through a chat hosted over the Matrix protocol. Twitter commissioned Jay Graber of the Happening decentralized social network to compose a technical review of the decentralized social network landscape.[8] She was hired to lead Bluesky in August 2021.[60][61] The Bluesky project incorporated as a company independent from Twitter in October 2021 due to Twitter's "very entrenched existing incentives".[17] Bluesky became a public benefit corporation in February 2022 with the mission to "develop and drive large-scale adoption of technologies for open and decentralized public conversation".[62]

Twitter executives approved of the initiative's scope and goals, which include what the protocol itself should encompass and what should be left to applications (the social networks built atop the standard). Some of these goals include letting applications customize their system of moderation, making applications responsible for compliance and takedown requests, and preventing virality algorithms from reinforcing controversy and moral outrage. The working group did not have a consensus toward these goals, so Twitter decided to field individual proposals, which ranged from reinforcing existing standards to endorsing standard interoperability, letting usage data decide where to invest. In early 2021, Bluesky was in a research phase, with 40–50 people from the decentralized technology community active in assessing options and assembling proposals for the protocol.[8] Bluesky Social's first three employees were hired in March 2022.[63] Around the same time, Dorsey acknowledged Bluesky's slow progress.[64]

Twitter's blockchain division, newly announced in November 2021, planned to work with the Bluesky initiative.[65] The division head resigned after Elon Musk bought Twitter in late 2022. Staff departures made the team's future remit unclear.[66] Musk's takeover did not immediately affect Bluesky Social's operations, as a separate entity, but does affect its long-term funding.[64] Bluesky Social had received $13 million from Twitter via Musk's initial offer in April 2022. Adi Robertson for The Verge wrote that even with Bluesky Social's independence, Musk's ownership of Twitter would make Bluesky Social easy to defund, with its main executive proponents having left Twitter.[23]

On July 5, 2023, Bluesky Social announced it had raised $8 million in a seed funding round.[67] The seed round was led by Neo, a firm with partners like Code.org co-founder Ali Partovi and former Twitter PM Suzanne Xie, and included other investors such as Joe Beda (co-creator of Kubernetes), Bob Young of Red Hat, Amjad Masad of Replit, Amir Shevat, Heather Meeker, Jeromy Johnson, and Automattic.[67] Bluesky Social plans to use the funds to grow its team, manage operations, pay for infrastructure costs, and build out the AT Protocol technology that it runs on.[67]

Prior to the seed round, Bluesky Social's website described the company as a public benefit LLC owned by Graber and other Bluesky Social employees.[68] Post-seed round, the company describes itself as a public-benefit C corporation.[67] The company has not publicly disclosed its charter.[68] On May 4, 2024, Jack Dorsey, Bluesky Social funder and initiator, announced on X that he was no longer on Bluesky Social's board, and Bluesky Social confirmed his departure.[69]

AT Protocol

[edit]
Main article: AT Protocol

Bluesky unveiled open source code in May 2022 for an early version of its distributed social network protocol, Authenticated Data Experiment (ADX),[32] since renamed the Authenticated Transfer (AT) Protocol.[23] The team opened its early code and placed it under an MIT License so that the development process would be seen in public.[32]

The AT Protocol's initial federation architecture centers around three main services: a Personal Data Server (PDS), Relay (previously referred to as a Big Graph Service, or BGS), and an AppView.[70] A PDS is a server which hosts user data[70] in "Data Repositories", which utilize a Merkle tree.[71] The PDS also handles user authentication and manages the signing keys for its hosted repositories. A Relay is described as analogous to an indexer on the web, ingesting repositories from a variety of different PDS hosts and serving them in a single unified stream for other services to ingest. AppViews, meanwhile, are services which consume data from a Relay and hydrate that data to provide behavior for specific clients, e.g. the microblogging feature set for the Bluesky app.[70]

See also

[edit]

References and notes

[edit]
  1. ^ "GitHub – bluesky-social/social-app – locales". GitHub. Archived from the original on October 28, 2024. Retrieved October 28, 2024.
  2. ^ a b c d "Frequently Asked Questions". Bluesky. Archived from the original on July 14, 2023. Retrieved July 23, 2023.
  3. ^ a b c "Division of Corporations - Filing". Government of Delaware. Archived from the original on September 21, 2015. Retrieved January 11, 2024. File Number: 6282898, Incorporation Date: 10/4/2021 (mm/dd/yyy), Entity Name: BLUESKY SOCIAL, PBC, Entity Kind: Corporation, Entity Type: Benefit Corporation, City: WILMINGTON, County: NEW CASTLE, State: DE
  4. ^ Silberling, Amanda (February 6, 2024). "Bluesky is now open for anyone to join". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on February 8, 2024. Retrieved February 8, 2024.
  5. ^ jazco.dev. "Stats for BlueSky by Jaz (jaz.bsky.social)". Archived from the original on October 25, 2023. Retrieved November 14, 2024.
  6. ^ Bell, Karissa (February 8, 2024). "Bluesky has added almost a million users one day after opening to the public". Engadget. Archived from the original on September 7, 2024. Retrieved February 8, 2024.
  7. ^ Davis, Eric. "bskycharts.edavis.dev". bskycharts. Archived from the original on September 7, 2024. Retrieved November 14, 2024.
  8. ^ a b c d Matney, Lucas (January 15, 2021). "Twitter's decentralized future". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on September 6, 2021. Retrieved September 6, 2021.
  9. ^ "The AT Protocol". Bluesky Blog. October 18, 2022. Retrieved September 8, 2024.
  10. ^ Graber, Jay (March 2, 2023). "Bluesky Private Beta Update". Bluesky Blog. Retrieved September 8, 2024.
  11. ^ "Company". Bluesky. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  12. ^ "Algorithmic choice". Bluesky. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  13. ^ Liu, Emily (April 28, 2023). "How to set your domain as your handle". Bluesky Blog. Archived from the original on September 3, 2024. Retrieved September 2, 2024.
  14. ^ Palmer, Annie (December 11, 2019). "Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has an idealistic vision for the future of social media and is funding a small team to chase it". CNBC. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  15. ^ Campbell, Ian Carlos (August 16, 2021). "Twitter's decentralized social network project finally has a leader". The Verge. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  16. ^ Hutchinson, Andrew (February 28, 2023). "Decentralized Twitter Alternative 'Bluesky' Launches in Private Beta". Social Media Today. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  17. ^ a b "Make Identity Central Again, with Bluesky's Jay Graber". dot-social.simplecast.com. October 1, 2024. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  18. ^ Patel, Nilay (March 25, 2024). "Bluesky CEO Jay Graber on breaking free from Twitter and competing with Threads and Mastodon". The Verge. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  19. ^ a b Oremus, Will (February 6, 2024). "Bluesky, a trendy rival to X, finally opens to the public". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on April 7, 2024. Retrieved February 6, 2024.
  20. ^ Reporter, Marie Boran Technology (November 12, 2024). "Is Elon Musk's X user exodus real?". Newsweek. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  21. ^ Silverman, Dwight (April 6, 2024). "How Twitter alternatives Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon are coming along". Houston Chronicle. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  22. ^ "Social networking technology created by Bluesky". GitHub. Archived from the original on May 2, 2023. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  23. ^ a b c d e Robertson, Adi (October 29, 2022). "Will Elon Musk keep funding Twitter's most interesting side project?". The Verge. Archived from the original on November 18, 2022. Retrieved January 22, 2023.
  24. ^ "Bluesky User FAQ". Bluesky Blog. March 19, 2023. Archived from the original on September 4, 2024. Retrieved September 5, 2024.
  25. ^ Lopatto, Elizabeth (April 27, 2023). "They're 'skeets' now". The Verge. Archived from the original on April 28, 2023. Retrieved April 28, 2023.
  26. ^ Uhl, Jordan [@JordanUhl] (May 1, 2023). ""There's a new social media app called Bluesky and on it @brianschatz just skeeted..." -@jaketapper" (Tweet). Retrieved May 2, 2023 – via Twitter.
  27. ^ Silberling, Amanda (April 27, 2023). "Bluesky's best shot at success is to embrace shitposting". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on April 27, 2023. Retrieved April 28, 2023.
  28. ^ Jeong, Sarah (May 2, 2023). "What's it like on Bluesky right now, anyways?". The Verge. Archived from the original on January 17, 2024. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  29. ^ Sung, Morgan (May 2, 2023). "For Bluesky to thrive, it needs sex workers and Black Twitter". Archived from the original on September 7, 2024. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  30. ^ Ho, Soleil (May 9, 2023). "Bluesky is the latest Twitter wannabe. Can it avoid the Nazi problem?". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on January 24, 2024. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  31. ^ Frenkel, Sheera (April 28, 2023). "What Is Bluesky and Why Are People Clamoring to Join It?". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on April 28, 2023. Retrieved April 28, 2023.
  32. ^ a b c Robertson, Adi (May 4, 2022). "Twitter's decentralized, open-source offshoot just released its first code". The Verge. Archived from the original on December 17, 2022. Retrieved January 22, 2023.
  33. ^ "Protocol Overview". AT Protocol. Archived from the original on May 2, 2023. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  34. ^ Woźniak, Michał "rysiek" (April 27, 2023). "BlueSky is cosplaying decentralization". Songs on the Security of Networks. Archived from the original on May 1, 2023. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  35. ^ a b Khalili, Joel (November 2, 2022). "Twitter Had a Plan to Fix Social Media. Will Elon Musk Follow It?". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on December 30, 2022. Retrieved January 22, 2023.
  36. ^ Perez, Sarah (February 28, 2023). "Jack Dorsey-backed Twitter alternative Bluesky hits the App Store as an invite-only app". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on March 6, 2023. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  37. ^ Li, Abner (April 20, 2023). "Decentralized Twitter competitor 'Bluesky' now has an Android app". 9to5Google. Archived from the original on April 20, 2023. Retrieved April 20, 2023.
  38. ^ Peters, Jay (April 19, 2023). "Bluesky, a decentralized Twitter alternative, is now on Android". MSN. The Verge. Archived from the original on April 20, 2023. Retrieved April 20, 2023.
  39. ^ a b Murphy, Hannah (May 2, 2023). "Jack Dorsey's Bluesky emerges as latest challenger to Elon Musk's Twitter". Financial Times. Archived from the original on May 2, 2023. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  40. ^ Vaughan-Nichols, Steven (May 16, 2023). "Bluesky Social just took a big open-source step forward". ZDNET. Archived from the original on July 21, 2023. Retrieved July 21, 2023.
  41. ^ "New feature just dropped: custom feeds!". Bluesky Social. May 26, 2023. Archived from the original on March 22, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  42. ^ Bell, Karissa (May 26, 2023). "Bluesky now lets you choose your own algorithm". Engadget. Archived from the original on January 6, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  43. ^ "Featured Community Project: SkyFeed". AT Protocol. August 8, 2023. Archived from the original on January 6, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  44. ^ Hatmaker, Taylor (September 13, 2023). "Bluesky officially hits 1 million users". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on January 31, 2024. Retrieved September 13, 2023.
  45. ^ "Bluesky's Surge To 2 Million Users: A New Era In Decentralized Social Networking". DailyCompanyNews. November 18, 2023. Archived from the original on March 22, 2024. Retrieved November 30, 2023.
  46. ^ Graber, Jay (December 21, 2023). "A New Look for Bluesky: The Social Butterfly". Bluesky Blog. Archived from the original on March 28, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  47. ^ Ranta, Petri (February 22, 2024). "X:n haastajaan iski käyttäjien vyöry yhdestä maasta – kuinka valvoa kieltä, jota ei puhu?" [An influx of users struck the challenger of X – how to moderate a language you don't speak?]. Mikrobitti (in Finnish).
  48. ^ Biller, David (August 29, 2024). "Brazil top court threatens to suspend X operations in latest twist of ongoing feud". Associated Press. Archived from the original on September 1, 2024. Retrieved September 1, 2024.
  49. ^ Binder, Matt (September 7, 2024). "Brazilian users flock to Bluesky after Elon Musk's X banned". Mashable. Retrieved September 8, 2024.
  50. ^ Ha, Anthony (August 31, 2024). "Bluesky tops app charts and sees 'all-time-highs' after Brazil bans X". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on September 1, 2024. Retrieved September 1, 2024.
  51. ^ Mehta, Ivan (September 17, 2024). "Bluesky now has more than 10M users". TechCrunch. Retrieved September 23, 2024.
  52. ^ "Share video on Bluesky!". Bluesky Blog. September 11, 2024. Retrieved September 11, 2024.
  53. ^ "Bluesky Soars to Top 5 Spot in US App Store After Rival X Changes How Blocks Work". CNET. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
  54. ^ Perez, Sarah (October 18, 2024). "Bluesky surges into the top 5 as X changes blocks, permits AI training on its data". TechCrunch. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
  55. ^ "Bluesky's official account on their site".
  56. ^ Davis, Wes (November 13, 2024). "Bluesky crosses the 15 million user mark". The Verge. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  57. ^ "Announcing Bluesky PBLLC". bsky.social. February 7, 2022. Archived from the original on November 10, 2024. Retrieved November 10, 2024.
  58. ^ Perez, Sarah (August 6, 2024). "Bluesky adds Techdirt founder Mike Masnick to its board". TechCrunch. TechCrunch, Inc. Retrieved October 18, 2024.
  59. ^ Masnick, Mike (December 11, 2019). "Twitter Makes A Bet On Protocols Over Platforms". Techdirt. Archived from the original on May 2, 2023. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  60. ^ Dang, Sheila (August 16, 2021). "Twitter-backed Bluesky picks tech entrepreneur to lead web research group". Reuters. Archived from the original on December 21, 2022. Retrieved January 23, 2023.
  61. ^ Wagner, Kurt (August 16, 2021). "Twitter Finds Leader for 'Decentralized' Social Media Project Bluesky". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on November 22, 2022. Retrieved January 23, 2023.
  62. ^ "Announcing Bluesky PBLLC". Bluesky. Retrieved November 13, 2024.
  63. ^ Dang, Sheila (March 31, 2022). "Social media interoperability project Bluesky names first employees". Reuters. Archived from the original on April 21, 2022. Retrieved April 21, 2022.
  64. ^ a b Smith, Tim (April 16, 2022). "Bluesky Funding to Be Reviewed If Twitter Owners Change: Dorsey". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on April 16, 2022. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  65. ^ Lyons, Kim (November 10, 2021). "Twitter is launching a dedicated crypto team, part of its push toward decentralization". The Verge. Archived from the original on November 17, 2021. Retrieved November 16, 2021.
  66. ^ Nicolle, Emily (November 18, 2022). "Twitter's Crypto Head and Staff Resign in Mass Musk Exodus". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on November 18, 2022. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  67. ^ a b c d Perez, Sarah (July 5, 2023). "Bluesky announces its $8M seed round and first paid service, custom domains". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on July 8, 2023. Retrieved July 8, 2023.
  68. ^ a b Lee, Micah (June 1, 2023). "Is Bluesky Billionaire-Proof?". The Intercept. Archived from the original on July 4, 2023. Retrieved July 4, 2023.
  69. ^ Getahun, Hannah (May 5, 2024). "Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is spilling tea all over the platform FKA Twitter and here's a possible reason". Business Insider. Insider Inc. Archived from the original on May 15, 2024. Retrieved May 6, 2024.
  70. ^ a b c "Federation Architecture Overview". Bluesky Blog. May 5, 2023. Archived from the original on September 7, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  71. ^ "Repository". AT Protocol. Archived from the original on January 6, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2024.
  1. ^ Commonly abbreviated as Bsky

Further reading

[edit]
[edit]

Media related to Bluesky Social at Wikimedia Commons

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bluesky&oldid=1257340885"