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With the new CEO in place, are there any plans to deal with the obnoxious userbase of Bluesky, and perhaps try to expand it out to reach people who don't exhibi

With the new CEO in place, are there any plans to deal with the obnoxious userbase of Bluesky, and perhaps try to expand it out to reach people who don't exhibit such high levels of toxicity?

whattheheckheck 7mo ago
Yeah its the same plans Elon has for X
smt88 7mo ago
This is a valid question. I agree politically with a lot of Bluesky users and still find it to be an awful space to hang out in.
- acjohnson55 7mo ago
  I agree, I'm sorry to say. I personally believe it's because they replicated the same incentive structure as Twitter. Being provocative generates engagement, which gets you reach and creates the perception of relevance. At first, people were just happy to be at an alternative to Elon Twitter. But good vibes only get you so far when the incentives point the other direction.
- meowface 7mo ago
  It's insufferable, yes. Even though I'm a left-liberal, it feels foreign to me. Twitter is worse at the limit (endless neo-Nazis and Maoists) but at least I feel some diversity while I'm there. Bluesky is so uniform in the annoyingness of its community.
OhioMan2943 7mo ago
As one of the first 10k beta users, who was fairly active, then moved back to twitter, I agree with this. The userbase is extremely off putting from the get go- it's not the fault of Graber or anyone else- but they should allow people to turn off the turbo redditor type people with a few settings.
- SecretDreams 7mo ago
  All social media roads lead back to the same place, imo. The only thing keeping HN for getting there sooner is its lack of popularity.
- SmirkingRevenge 7mo ago
  You basically can, can't you, with it's robust blocking features and feeds? Personally, I've found bsky has a far healthier culture than Twitter, even before Musk turned it into his own personal megaphone/therapist and neo-nazi safe-space (and I follow a lot of political accounts) The lack of payouts for engaging posts and the robust blocking really does change the incentive structure over there. That twitter-style toxic engagement-bait type posting doesn't get rewarded as much. There are some far-left groups there who are very toxic and will harass some people, but they are easy to block. Most of them seem to block people at the drop of a hat anyways, and so end up in their own isolated bubbles.
- pcthrowaway 7mo ago
  > As one of the first 10k beta users, who was fairly active, then moved back to twitter, I agree with this. The userbase is extremely off putting from the get go Very surprised to hear this... the few times I've visited Twitter in the last year I've been met with a deluge of racist, homophobic, transphobic, and misogynistic comments. Like there's practically no moderation on there. People saying "Hitler was right the whole time" and shit like that. I don't use Bluesky much either but I definitely wouldn't have considered it worse than Twitter
  - animal_spirits 7mo ago
    Its not worse than twitter. It's not close in compared to toxicity; though i've personally noticed a high-minded snobbishness toxicity that shuts down discussion on it.
  - acjohnson55 7mo ago
    Twitter still attracts top quality initial posts from prominent people, even though the replies are garbage, or worse. Honestly, it doesn't compute to me how people can justify continuing to contribute there.
subscribed 7mo ago
And that in comparison to Reddit ot Twitter?! :D
- datahack 7mo ago
  The majority of humanity is not meaningfully engaged even if they are active on social media platforms. It has a long way to go.
- vetrom 7mo ago
  Yes, in the case of Twitter/X. A considerably wider range of expressed preference&opinion is permitted there before platform moderators will aggressively ban or users start flag/report brigades.
  - blackqueeriroh 7mo ago
    Oooh not true

With the new CEO in place, are there any plans to deal with the obnoxious userbase of Bluesky, and perhaps try to expand it out to reach people who don't exhibit such high levels of toxicity?

whattheheckheck 7mo ago

Yeah its the same plans Elon has for X

smt88 7mo ago

This is a valid question. I agree politically with a lot of Bluesky users and still find it to be an awful space to hang out in.

acjohnson55 7mo ago
I agree, I'm sorry to say. I personally believe it's because they replicated the same incentive structure as Twitter. Being provocative generates engagement, which gets you reach and creates the perception of relevance. At first, people were just happy to be at an alternative to Elon Twitter. But good vibes only get you so far when the incentives point the other direction.
meowface 7mo ago
It's insufferable, yes. Even though I'm a left-liberal, it feels foreign to me. Twitter is worse at the limit (endless neo-Nazis and Maoists) but at least I feel some diversity while I'm there. Bluesky is so uniform in the annoyingness of its community.

OhioMan2943 7mo ago

As one of the first 10k beta users, who was fairly active, then moved back to twitter, I agree with this. The userbase is extremely off putting from the get go- it's not the fault of Graber or anyone else- but they should allow people to turn off the turbo redditor type people with a few settings.

SecretDreams 7mo ago
All social media roads lead back to the same place, imo. The only thing keeping HN for getting there sooner is its lack of popularity.
SmirkingRevenge 7mo ago
You basically can, can't you, with it's robust blocking features and feeds? Personally, I've found bsky has a far healthier culture than Twitter, even before Musk turned it into his own personal megaphone/therapist and neo-nazi safe-space (and I follow a lot of political accounts) The lack of payouts for engaging posts and the robust blocking really does change the incentive structure over there. That twitter-style toxic engagement-bait type posting doesn't get rewarded as much. There are some far-left groups there who are very toxic and will harass some people, but they are easy to block. Most of them seem to block people at the drop of a hat anyways, and so end up in their own isolated bubbles.
pcthrowaway 7mo ago
> As one of the first 10k beta users, who was fairly active, then moved back to twitter, I agree with this. The userbase is extremely off putting from the get go Very surprised to hear this... the few times I've visited Twitter in the last year I've been met with a deluge of racist, homophobic, transphobic, and misogynistic comments. Like there's practically no moderation on there. People saying "Hitler was right the whole time" and shit like that. I don't use Bluesky much either but I definitely wouldn't have considered it worse than Twitter
- animal_spirits 7mo ago
  Its not worse than twitter. It's not close in compared to toxicity; though i've personally noticed a high-minded snobbishness toxicity that shuts down discussion on it.
- acjohnson55 7mo ago
  Twitter still attracts top quality initial posts from prominent people, even though the replies are garbage, or worse. Honestly, it doesn't compute to me how people can justify continuing to contribute there.

subscribed 7mo ago

And that in comparison to Reddit ot Twitter?! :D

datahack 7mo ago
The majority of humanity is not meaningfully engaged even if they are active on social media platforms. It has a long way to go.
vetrom 7mo ago
Yes, in the case of Twitter/X. A considerably wider range of expressed preference&opinion is permitted there before platform moderators will aggressively ban or users start flag/report brigades.
- blackqueeriroh 7mo ago
  Oooh not true