Bluesky and the future of social media

It hurts seeing such beautiful posts on X with barely any views these days. Ever since X changed gutted their algorithm and replaced it with AI at the end of last year, there have been huge crack downs on providers. Companions are now getting suspended and banned left and right at a much higher volume than previously in addition to being shadowbanned. For this reason, many of us are leaving this “cursed platform” (as a colleague put it), turning to the alternative Bluesky, referred to with the 🦋 emoji. Other than the suspensions and the skewed feeds, there are so many more reasons to ditch X:

• The algorithm not showing you want you want to see anymore

• X being subject to Elon Musk’s whims

• Grok’s ability to still be used to create deepfake nudes and sexualized images of people

• The lack of ability to truly block someone on X, as they remain able to see your posts

• Lack of sufficient moderation of spam and fake accounts (because this helps X generate revenue)

• Users’ content is used to train AI

Meanwhile, in November 2024, Bluesky stated: “We do not use any of your content to train generative AI, and have no intention of doing so.” Bluesky’s algorithm shows people what they want to see and also gives the option of custom feeds. You can pin feeds others have created to your home page. Mel created a guide for feeds. One feed to pin to engage with providers is “OurSky.” Another feed of note is “OnlyPosts.” This hides the replies and reposts from those you follow. To pin this feed, go to the search bar and type “OnlyPosts.” Then click on “Feeds,” and it will be right there for you to pin.

You can also get started in finding providers by stumbling upon “starter packs.” These are lists of accounts that anyone can create. They can be found organically through providers sharing them on the feed, or through the “starter packs” tab under an account profile, which shows you the starter packs they created. Currently, the only way to know when you are added to a starter pack is to follow @listications.app. I thank Mikaela for sharing this information in her blog post. She also shared a resource for scheduling posts on Bluesky in her blog.

Before beginning to use Bluesky, you should login to your web browser and change Bluesky’s default moderation settings. This can only be done in your browser and not in the app. Go to https://bsky.app/moderation. Then you can adjust the filters so that you see adult content.

“Sx workers built the internet”

The mass suspensions and censorship providers are facing on X is part of a larger picture of sx workers building the internet and being ditched when no longer needed. Tumblr heavily grew off of the traffic that sx workers were bringing it until it banned NSFW content in 2018. Sx workers brought in millions of views to YouTube before the adpocalypse. Sx workers were a huge percentage of people using private snaps before Snapchat cracked down on sx work. Sx work accounts were central to Instagram’s engagement before it became hostile to them... Sx workers built the modern creator economy. However, platforms ditch sx workers not only because of stigma, but because by U.S. law, they have to. FOSTA-SESTA, passed in 2018, make platforms liable for the facilitation of the sex trade. It was passed with the supposed intention of stopping sx trafficking, but instead has made life more dangerous and difficult for sx workers in numerous ways. I know that Bluesky as an app will be no exception to the trend. Right now, Bluesky is not banning providers massively. But it is not exactly a sx work friendly platform because by law it cannot be. My friend was already banned on Bluesky, and I’ve heard of other providers being banned. Bluesky will grow off of sx workers only to ditch them, like every other major social media platform. This is why I have a Bluesky backup account. And this is why it is so important for clients to be flexible in what apps they use to engage with sx workers. X is no longer working and right now Bluesky is. The cycle will not end until sx work is fully decriminalized and destigmatized. However!!!!! The great thing about Bluesky is that it is decentralized! This is a huge change. It gives me so much hope. More on that later. Real world effects How many times will we have to rebuild until sx work is decriminalized and destigmatized? The shutting down of providers' social media accounts has real world effects. My friend recently lost her well-established Facebook account and lost all her online connections to community. It was devastating to her and effectively served to sever her from decades of connections. The banning of accounts happens in the U.S. under the guise of reducing trafficking, but in reality it is people engaging in fully consensual sx who are shut down. In general, worldwide, the targeting of sx workers' access to online advertising serves to push more vulnerable people into street work and more dangerous situations. I am privileged in the sense that I request compensation for my time for dates and arrangements that I am interested in and that I do not rely on this for complete survival. And over time, I have seen this less as work and more like dating, gravitating to the label "professional companion" more than "sx worker." That does not mean that the stigma against sx work does not affect my life significantly in many different areas. Even in my privileged state, I have to worry about the burden that losing my X account would be to me. I have spent so many hours on X building connections and have met and continue to meet so many wonderful men who found me through X. Happily, that is now beginning to become the case with Bluesky.

To those who worry about the loss of connections that comes with losing their X account, I recommend going on the web and requesting a copy of your data.

Clients and suitors who follow companions and shift into Bluesky constitute some of my favorites. People who make the shift onto a new app are the kind of open-minded, supportive, and adaptable people that I desire to associate with. I love decentralization!

Now, back to the particular subject of Bluesky.

One of the major things I like about Bluesky is that it has built a protocol that allows decentralization. Think of Bluesky like an email provider. Gmail and ProtonMail are different email providers. But they use the same email system to talk to each other.

Bluesky is trying to work the same way. It functions on the AT Protocol. Right now, most people use the official Bluesky app. But there exist other apps that use the AT Protocol. If you log in on one of those apps, you can see the same people you follow and post to the same network. People using the Bluesky app would still see your posts.

Normally, your social media username belongs to the platform. If the platform bans you or it disappears, your name disappears with it. Bluesky is different. On Bluesky, you can use a username tied to a custom domain. My username on Bluesky is @delilahlovegood.ch. Most people on Bluesky use the standard Bluesky username, like the one my backup account uses, @a-forestnymph.bsky.social. This is a handle owned by Bluesky. If Bluesky vanished tomorrow, all of the usernames that end in bsky.social would disappear. Everyone's posts posted from the Bluesky app (from all users) would disappear as well, since those were hosted on Bluesky's servers. Meanwhile, the usernames tied to custom domains would still exist, and another app using the AT Protocol would still recognize them. This means that Bluesky as an app does not have control over one's digital identity and social network in the way all the major social media platforms do. If Bluesky decides to start cracking down on providers, Bluesky deleting accounts using custom domain handles would only delete those accounts from its app and not erase their identities or abilities to exist on another app using the AT Protocol. Those accounts would not show up in the Bluesky app at all, however. Only people using other apps compatible with the AT Protocol would see your new posts when you start posting from one of those apps. This is why I have a Bluesky backup account still, to protect my visibility within the Bluesky app.

Sorry if you are not a tech person and got confused now. That's ok, because I enjoy confusing people :) Just know this is all very cool because it breaks the power platforms usually have over your digital existence. And it means that the AT Protocol is the hope for the future of social media for sx workers. See you on 🦋 then ;)