> I have written before in The Atlantic about a problem that I see as superordinate to all of these others: People just aren’t meant to talk with one another this much
The irony of publishing an article intended for a mass audience about how people shouldn't talk to each other. Obviously journalists are the only ones who can be trusted with such power...
Err, turning "shouldn't be talking to each other this much" to "shouldn't be talking to each other" is quite the leap. The author is clearly referring to the minute-by-minute stimulation that a microblogging platform provides, not making the case that people should be cutting off all communication with each other.
I'm not familiar with the other similar sites, but Bluesky seems much more interesting as a product than Twitter/X ever did. I think the way they encourage users to build/share custom feeds, and especially how they can be independent of your follow graph, is really interesting. The problem with these sites has always been having a single algorithmic feed controlled by someone else IMO.
Some interesting feeds I've seen are only posts by mutuals, lots of curated feeds that just show a subset of posts by a small number of accounts (whether or not you follow them), a following feed that filters out reposts/replies, a custom open source Discover algorithm based on your likes.
This feels way more interesting to me than anything Twitter/X has ever tried to do, even if you really like their single algorithm and the way their following feed works.
Custom feeds and starter packs seem to be promoted much more on Bluesky than lists were on Twitter, but how different are the actual capabilities from Twitter lists? I never looked at my algorithmic feed. Instead I make a "list" of accounts I followed and pinned that list to my home view. That way I only got exactly their posts in chronological order (with no ads). I saw that recommended by some HN user long ago, but I don't remember who.
I have fully switched to Bluesky at this point anyway, but the list approach worked fine for me on Twitter long after most users were complaining about the feed algo.
I thought Twitter lists could only be used for a list of accounts, so you'd see everything posted by everyone in the list. Whereas Bluesky feeds can only show posts with certain tags/content etc, and can be based on things like your following/likes without you maintaining the list of those. I might be wrong though about the limitations of lists because I never used them much.
And the starter packs who make it easy and quick to straight up build a follow base of curated content uniquely. That stuff only makes Twitter less relevant in an instant.
It's not that interesting, it's essentially just tweaking some knobs here and there. The problems it causes are far worse though, it just intensifies echo chambers, and self-selected filter bubbles, and ultimately ignorance and polarization.
The Twitter replacement for me isn't Bluesky, it's a combination of Bluesky and being less online. I won't get attached to Bluesky. If it significantly degrades like Twitter I'll move on from it pretty easily. I've already started to get mildly turned off by Bluesky since it began interrupting profiles and feeds with "suggestion" blocks. The engagement hacking has started.
Elon buying Twitter and ruining the platform with spam, lower quality posts being promoted, and many of my favorite creators leaving. It cured my Twitter addiction. So I appreciate Elon for that.
Back when I was younger and addicted to Reddit I remember unfollowing all my subreddits and hacking together a little script that hid the follow button. That friction made Reddit a lot less desirable.
I’ll no doubt eventually try out Bluesky, but I don’t think it could ever capture Twitter’s magic pre-Elon.
Counterexamples include LinkedIn, HN and various subreddits (not all) - they're operating at large scale, very lively but low levels of nasty (as a percentage).
IME, LinkedIn suffers from a different problem: on there, "everything is awesome", and the toxic positivity embedded in its DNA always snuffs out any authentic rancor.
So yes, it's free of bad behavior -- but it's also free of "normal" conversations. It's just full of "thought leaders", "visionaries", and "visionary thought leaders".
isn't it obvious to everyone that the X/Twitter exodus is just a forum split?
haven't all of us of a certain age participated in a forum that eventually devolved into drama, and then everyone picks sides, and someone makes a new forum, and half the group leaves?
That's all that's happening on X. Now we have a bunch of twitters: X, Bluesky, Truth, Fediverse.
They're all twitters and the X exodus is just a twitter split. X will go on, but smaller, and people will share posts between the twitters the way they always have shared posted between social media sites: with screenshots.
Anecdotal but for my startup (caido.io) I have seen an uptick of follows this week on bluesky. I had abandoned hope a few months ago, but I will restart posting our company updates on it.
Readit News
The irony of publishing an article intended for a mass audience about how people shouldn't talk to each other. Obviously journalists are the only ones who can be trusted with such power...
Both of them are people putting/ publishing text out to a mass audience, in a public way.
Some interesting feeds I've seen are only posts by mutuals, lots of curated feeds that just show a subset of posts by a small number of accounts (whether or not you follow them), a following feed that filters out reposts/replies, a custom open source Discover algorithm based on your likes.
This feels way more interesting to me than anything Twitter/X has ever tried to do, even if you really like their single algorithm and the way their following feed works.
I have fully switched to Bluesky at this point anyway, but the list approach worked fine for me on Twitter long after most users were complaining about the feed algo.
Dead Comment
Back when I was younger and addicted to Reddit I remember unfollowing all my subreddits and hacking together a little script that hid the follow button. That friction made Reddit a lot less desirable.
I’ll no doubt eventually try out Bluesky, but I don’t think it could ever capture Twitter’s magic pre-Elon.
Counterexamples include LinkedIn, HN and various subreddits (not all) - they're operating at large scale, very lively but low levels of nasty (as a percentage).
IME, LinkedIn suffers from a different problem: on there, "everything is awesome", and the toxic positivity embedded in its DNA always snuffs out any authentic rancor.
So yes, it's free of bad behavior -- but it's also free of "normal" conversations. It's just full of "thought leaders", "visionaries", and "visionary thought leaders".
haven't all of us of a certain age participated in a forum that eventually devolved into drama, and then everyone picks sides, and someone makes a new forum, and half the group leaves?
That's all that's happening on X. Now we have a bunch of twitters: X, Bluesky, Truth, Fediverse.
They're all twitters and the X exodus is just a twitter split. X will go on, but smaller, and people will share posts between the twitters the way they always have shared posted between social media sites: with screenshots.
Nature is healing.
He has the resources to keep it going for years as a forum for his groupies, but if anyone else were in charge it would be a die-off for sure.