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Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

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Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#51

Post by BeetleB »

raincole wrote: post #28

Bluesky's feed algorithm (the "Discover" tab) is the worst I've ever seen. Hands down. I can't imagine anyone enjoying it unless they're 1) super into the US politics/domestic issues AND 2) politically aligned with the main user base of Bluesky. The funniest part is that there is a better algorithm. It's right here: https://bsky.app/profile/spacecowboy17.bsky.social/feed/for-... But somehow the devs of Bluesky never…

> Bluesky's feed algorithm (the "Discover" tab) is the worst I've ever seen.

Even worse than Mastodon's?

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#52

Post by CSSer »

anon7000 wrote: post #39
raincole wrote: post #28

Bluesky's feed algorithm (the "Discover" tab) is the worst I've ever seen. Hands down. I can't imagine anyone enjoying it unless they're 1) super into the US politics/domestic issues AND 2) politically aligned with the main user base of Bluesky. The funniest part is that there is a better algorithm. It's right here: https://bsky.app/profile/spacecowboy17.bsky.social/feed/for-... But somehow the devs of Bluesky never…

The fact that Bluesky has first class support for me to choose my own feed algorithm is proof it’s NOTHING like truth social.

Whenever I point out (in agreement with your statement) that the idea that the left and the right are somehow equally bad is a kind of fantasy on HN I usually get downvoted. People seem very committed to "shades of gray", moderate thinking to the point that it's viewed as always correct, which is well, just wrong. Yeah, often things are more complicated than they appear, but I find it almost hilarious how often you can't do that in American politics. And for the record I'm definitely not saying the left is somehow perfect. Obviously the left is a bit of a mess too. It's just that they're not the same kinds of messes across party lines.

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#53

Post by irishcoffee »

FeloniousHam wrote: post #5
EA-3167 wrote: post #2

I hope against hope that people started to realize that the problem isn't the platform, it's the entire approach. Who am I kidding, people just realized that Bluesky wasn't going to be the next big thing and so it collapsed into being a mediocre bubble like Twitter, but without the scale.

> it collapsed into being a mediocre bubble like Twitter, but without the scale. I liked Josh Barro's take: https://www.joshbarro.com/p/bluesky-isnt-a-bubble-its-a-cont...

[dead]

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#54

Post by jryle70 »

brooke2k wrote: post #43
ecshafer wrote: post #30

Bluesky and Threads both have a fundamental issue in that their entire pitch is "We are like Twitter, but we are not run by Elon Musk, a Republican." Which only energizes the most radical, fringe, terminally online, who happen to be the ones that were most disliked on regular Twitter in the first place. When you whole pitch has zero appeal to 95% of people, its dead.

calling elon musk "a Republican" is such a wild understatement

[flagged]

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#55

Post by antisthenes »

CSSer wrote: post #52
anon7000 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that Bluesky has first class support for me to choose my own feed algorithm is proof it’s NOTHING like truth social.

Whenever I point out (in agreement with your statement) that the idea that the left and the right are somehow equally bad is a kind of fantasy on HN I usually get downvoted. People seem very committed to "shades of gray", moderate thinking to the point that it's viewed as always correct, which is well, just wrong. Yeah, often things are more complicated than they appear, but I find it almost hilarious how often you c…

> People seem very committed to "shades of gray", moderate thinking to the point that it's viewed as always correct, which is well, just wrong.

> And for the record I'm definitely not saying the left is somehow perfect. Obviously the left is a bit of a mess too. It's just that they're not the same kinds of messes across party lines.

Seems like you've fallen to the same fallacy within the same paragraph, which is quite ironic.

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#57

Post by BeetleB »

omoikane wrote: post #15

Maybe Bluesky is not quite the Twitter rival it set out to be, but it's got a better shot than Mastodon, according to the user count graphs here: https://bsky.jazco.dev/stats https://mastodon-analytics.com/ Bluesky has a higher total user count. I think the number of active users might be higher too, but I am not sure what's mastodon's definition of an active user for the second link above. Anecdotally, Bluesky feels…

I'd love to see similar plots after you remove the primary servers in each! To give you a rough idea: 78% of the people I follow on Mastodon are not on the primary instance, and over 80% of my followers are not either.

> Anecdotally, Bluesky feels more lively for me because that seem to be the default destination for Twitter refugees.

It likely is the default of Twitter refugees, but as a Mastodon user none of this is relevant to me! I don't care how many more users a network has, as long as the one I'm on has a healthy number. Very few of the people I follow are likely to leave Mastodon.

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#58

Post by BeetleB »

semiquaver wrote: post #34

As an anecdote, I switched a year or two ago along with most everyone I followed on X. It’s nothing like the vibe on old Twitter. I hate to say it, but it’s just too ideologically siloed. I’m quite left of center, but everyone on bluesky seems to be a caricature; the blue-haired loonies the right memes about. People there are seriously intolerant of anything other than their perceived orthodoxy. I don’t know what mad…

I find it interesting that most conversations about Twitter or Bluesky is about the "political vibe".

Why is that so important?

On Mastodon, if someone keeps posting political stuff to the point where it's a big chunk of my feed, I merely unfollow. As a result my feed has very little politics. Can't you simply do that on Bluesky?

Of course, if you actively want politics, but want just the right kind of politics, then you've dug yourself into a hole.

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#59

Post by Karrot_Kream »

tptacek wrote: post #22
omoikane wrote: post #15

Maybe Bluesky is not quite the Twitter rival it set out to be, but it's got a better shot than Mastodon, according to the user count graphs here: https://bsky.jazco.dev/stats https://mastodon-analytics.com/ Bluesky has a higher total user count. I think the number of active users might be higher too, but I am not sure what's mastodon's definition of an active user for the second link above. Anecdotally, Bluesky feels…

The distinction is that Mastodon doesn't have to grow, and Bluesky does. There's an extent to which Bluesky is viable because its venture-funded owner pays for the infrastructure it operates on (Mastodon communities generally have to stand on their own two feet). If there's no path for Bluesky to grow into a viable business on its current financial runway, the funding for the infrastructure will end.

ATProto infrastructure is mostly open and there are folks operating pieces of it independently even if the landscape is dominated by the Bluesky PBC. It's true that Mastodon grew bottom-up without centralized funding so the shuttering of the PBC will be a big deal for the AT ecosystem but it's all independently doable.

Re: Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app

#60

Post by Karrot_Kream »

amatecha wrote: post #32
omoikane wrote: post #15

Maybe Bluesky is not quite the Twitter rival it set out to be, but it's got a better shot than Mastodon, according to the user count graphs here: https://bsky.jazco.dev/stats https://mastodon-analytics.com/ Bluesky has a higher total user count. I think the number of active users might be higher too, but I am not sure what's mastodon's definition of an active user for the second link above. Anecdotally, Bluesky feels…

Mastodon isn't trying to compete anyway, it's not a Product(tm) driven by desire for profits, so the people who use it don't care if it "wins" or becomes more popular than whatever other platform. We're all just hanging out socializing and stuff, sharing neat things and discussing things like communities do. It's not easy to accurately estimate active Mastodon/Fediverse users, but then again, I'm not sure anyone real…

I've never been a fan of the "Product driven by desire for profits" line because it simplifies too much into too little imo. The reason people like scale is that it brings a diverse set of interests. For better or for worse, most Mastodon servers I've seen have a pretty similar set of interests. They're really the same constellation of interests I've seen heavily represented on internet forums since the late '90s. There's nothing wrong with that, but between IRC, web blogs, web forums, Reddit, HN, Discords, and conventional social media, I don't think you'll find a shortage of folks interested in those topics.

Meanwhile there's a lot of topics where a critical mass of fans only really exists on Big Tech Social Media and maybe the occasional subject subreddit. The hope of an open platform at scale is to expose those niche interests to open infrastructure.

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