Voxel Hub is joining Bluesky today, so I would like to take a moment to explain why we are doing this and what are the benefits of joining this new social media network. Bluesky emerged as a strong competitor to X (previously Twitter) and, more recently, to Facebook/Instagram and other Meta tools. It’s a new platform with huge popularity, gaining users to the point of being noticeable. Many of our tribes moved there due to the liberal, progressive values we aspire to and promote. Bluesky is not without its challenges and we are yet to see how its future may be secured. However, for now, if you are looking for a social platform supporting good digital wellbeing, I strongly recommend it. Here’s why:
- It’s ad-free. I must admit, it is absolutely impossible to use Facebook, Instagram or X these days without a mass noise of advertising on our screens – not to mention the most irritating and disrupting adverts in videos. Bluesky, so far, serves content from the feeds we follow and offers the “discover” tab, too, but it doesn’t serve adverts in your feed. This feels so spacious and so liberating!
- It feels as connecting and enjoyable as X/Twitter in its early days. As the local lead of the Twestival (Twitter Festival), I still remember the incredible power of that channel to bring people together locally around mutual interests and causes. Finding content and interacting with people is easy without the unnecessary noise of algorithmic ads and content recommendations.
- It is a supportive community. Yes, we start to see some weird accounts emerging there, too – which tends to be the cost of more open platforms (although I would argue that X is full of bots, and now Facebook with their AI agents also creates a lot of confusion). However, generally, people who care about your work and topics will follow you back, curate lists of accounts, and interact with your content. Thus, it is a space for authentic, supportive conversations.
- It is designed to facilitate open conversations. Good social media channels tend to facilitate the opening of reach of our messages, their amplification to reach similarly minded people or to engage in fruitful online interactions and collaborations. Companies like X and Meta have forgotten this core goal of social media platforms, carried away with boosting their own profits.
- It supports building new apps to offer alternatives to those dominant, closed and monetised environments. For example, Instagram might soon have a strong competitor in the form of Flashes, a new photo-sharing app.
Here at Voxel Hub, we believe in open dialogue across nuance and differences, so we support channels where such conversations are possible, enabled, and, hopefully, protected. If you want to talk to us on Bluesky or read our insights there, follow us @voxelhub.bsky.social there. We look forward to connecting with you.
Photo by Kumiko SHIMIZU on Unsplash
