Bluesky is having a momentum. The recent events in United States and
seemingly increasing Republican control over Instagram, Threads and
TikTok accelerated will to find something better, as non-corporate as possible and resistant to the whims of its owners.
I
reckon this website already exists and it’s called Bluesky. Bluesky
had a slow start, it was originally invite-only and I got there
thanks to the kindness of some stranger. Even while open, at first it
clearly lost competition with Threads, that cheated its way to their
„hundred million of users” basically creating a placeholder
account for everyone using Instagram. But now, after US elections,
Bluesky grew immensely in popularity, the process is very fast –
while Threads is dying out, and its users are mostly angrily posting
about Mark Zuckerberg.
I
wanna help building music community on Bluesky – or, rebuild what
we’ve already had elsewhere, and also show why it can be better
here. This is the post that I’ve been thinking about for a while.
As a sort of Bluesky veteran, I’m collecting all the tips that I’ve
shared with new users over these past few weeks. While the post is
targeting music folks – and I’m talking about writers like me,
musicians, label owners, A&R people, promoters, festival
organizers etc etc. – I think everyone can take something from it.
Enjoy reading it,
and most importantly, enjoy our new platform.
Why Bluesky?
Just a couple of
bullet points I’m listing over and over again.
- Bluesky doesn’t
train AI on what You write. It’s, with Mastodon, the only
major social media that doesn’t do so.
-
Bluesky doesn’t throttle your links like other websites. Since the
following feed is on by default, it means your posts will be better
seen than on the other social media. In fact, popular media
organizations like The Guardian revealed that they’re getting more
referral traffic from Bluesky than elsewhere
https://pressgazette.co.uk/platforms/bluesky-x-traffic-guardian-boston-globe-news/
From my own personal experience, it’s clear than I’m getting more
notifications here than anywhere else, I finally feel appreciated and
I’m surprised how fast I grew my new community.
- Unlike other social media platforms, Bluesky doesn't hire politicians so its algorithm is free from the bias. Facebook, Instagram or X censor the posts related to abortion, LGBT issues or the Palestine genocide (they also profit from Israeli military ads). Threads and Instagram abandoned their fact check system to satisfy conservatives. Bluesky doesn't do any of that.
- Bluesky is more accessible for disabled users than other platforms. Including alt-text with your images is recommended and it can be longer than on any other platform.
- you can move your old posts from Twitter - or sync both accounts if you don't have time to crosspost
- Bluesky has better
protection from trolls than elsewhere – even if Threads is already
stealing its features
-
Controversial billionaire Jack Dorsey was originally involved in
creating Bluesky, but left, when his ideas clearly didn’t align
with the rest of the owners. He is no longer involved in any
capacity.
- This is what the
developers Paul Frazee and Emily Liu said about the mission of
Bluesky in Reddit AMA, including explaining what are the current
ideas about financing.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BlueskySocial/comments/1gyfram/hi_were_members_of_the_bluesky_team_ama/
I
really don’t want this article to become a propaganda piece. It’s
already an advertisement of sort and I HATE those! We’ve been here
before, obviously, we had a lot of shiny websites that promised
something new and then were taken over by billionaires who revealed
their worst tendencies. You don’t have to tell me – I’ve built
my blog – and my whole writing careeer - on one of them, and in
hindsight, it wasn’t my best idea. Writer Cory Doctorow, who
originally coined a term enshittification, criticized Bluesky for the
fact that it’s not entirely decentralized like Mastodon – you can
read his remarks here
https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/02/ulysses-pact/
Here’s a response from Bluesky’s Mike Masnick
https://www.techdirt.com/2025/01/21/the-technological-poison-pill-how-atprotocol-encourages-competition-resists-evil-billionaires-lock-in-enshittification/
As a
matter of fact, as mentioned by Masnick, a group called Free Our
Feeds, supported by people like actor Mark Ruffalo, is already
building a prototype of Bluesky competitor, also built on ATProtocol
but separate from the app. We can never know for sure but I can only
hope that these efforts will be proven succesful.
Import
your contacts
After
signing up, the first thing you wanna do is follow people that you
know. I’d recommend a browser extension called Sky Follower Bridge,
available for Chrome, Chrome-based browsers - and
Firefox. It supports a couple popular social media websites –
you’ll have to sign in to your Bluesky account, open the
following/follower list on the other social website and start
scanning. The process is relatively automatic, if it gets stuck or
finish before it reaches the end of the list, you can resume it. Be
careful with automatic following – while usually reliable, it can
give you false positives.
By
the way, this is one of few reasons why I discourage deleting your
account from other social websites. If you don’t wanna post there
anymore – it’s fine. But I don’t think you wanna abandon your
contacts there, so if you wanna help them find you on Bluesky – it
goes both ways.
Chrome
Web Store:
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/sky-follower-bridge/behhbpbpmailcnfbjagknjngnfdojpko
Firefox:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/sky-follower-bridge/
More from developer:
www.sky-follower-bridge.dev
https://www.sky-follower-bridge.dev/get-started.html
The Twitter/X synchronization
I abstained from mentioning Twitter in the first version of this article. It's a controversial subject and I really think Bluesky can be more than just "a place to move from Twitter'. However...
If you wanna delete your X account, but move your old tweets to Bluesky, you can do so with https://bluemigrate.com
Alternatively, if you wanna sync your X and Bluesky accounts and post from both at the same time, you can do it with https://www.syncpost.app
Starter Packs and
Music community on Bluesky
A good way to find
people on Bluesky to follow is by using Starter Packs – the compiled
lists of people that you can follow with one click or browse
separately.
I promised them in the first version of this post. Now I can finally share with you our own starter packs! There will be more of them, likely!
Music Stars Of Bluesky https://bsky.app/starter-pack/mavoyofficial.bsky.social/3lmpkco4q7y2z
Mavoy Music's Friends (on Bluesky and other social media) https://bsky.app/starter-pack/mavoyofficial.bsky.social/3lmpkpuu6qf2u
I would also recommend Starter Packs from two other trusted music blogs
These are The Line
Of Blue Fit
https://www.thelineofbestfit.com/news/bluesky-guide-music-fan-starter-packs
and Drowned In Sound
https://bsky.app/profile/drownedinsound.org/post/3lbdgwbga5k22
You won’t get notified when you’re added - but you can find
Starter Packs and other lists you’re on, using this website.
https://clearsky.app/ That’s
how I found that I’m myself on The Line Of Best Fit bloggers list,
I’m very grateful!
Verify yourself
on Bluesky
Now,
before you even start posting, it’s probably a good time to verify
yourself. Bluesky has some impersonators, at this moment it’s also got quite a lot new
accounts with names of famous musicians with no profile pic or bio.
It’s hard to say if these accounts are legit or not. Malicious
actors are reported fast, but if you wanna make sure that it’s
really you who people hear from – you can verify yourself.
Currently, you can do it if you own a domain for your website. Head
here for more information:
https://bsky.social/about/blog/4-28-2023-domain-handle-tutorial
At the end of the
process, you’ll receive a changed username that will be, in fact,
your domain. For a good example of that, check out Weyes Blood’s
account.
https://bsky.app/profile/weyesblood.com
I
believe there was originally an account for „Weyes Blood” that
wasn’t real, so Natalie intervened. At the moment of writing this,
she hasn’t posted yet, but thanks to the name, I’m 100% sure it’s
her real account.
Bluesky announced that they will be rolling out their own version of "blue check" verification, minus all the negatives that they are associated with them on X/Twitter, of course.
App Passwords
If
you used Sky Follower Bridge, you’ve already encountered the term
„app passwords”. App passwords are additional protection of your
account. If you don’t want to give a password to your account to a
third party tool, like that extension, you can generate an app
password in Bluesky security settings. It can be only viewed once so
if you wanna use it in the future, you better save it somewhere!
At
this point, I’d also encourage to use the other security setting –
two factor verification, because you should use two factor
verification EVERYWHERE you can. Unfortunately, Bluesky hasn’t
added a verification by authetication apps yet, but for now you can
use 2FA through e-mail and I have it on!
Protection
against trolls
Trolls kill social media. I’m an idealist, I believe that social
media are not just megaphones to try to shout out whatever you have
to share, but also a place to make a connection. And through my own
career, I met online people I’d never expect – or dream! - to
meet. But trolls are key reasons why people are migrating and
sometimes unfortunately abandon social media altogether.
Bluesky has a few unique features for protection against trolls.The
most important are labelers – third party services that provide the
lists of malicious actors. You can mute or block them all with one
click, and boom, they’re gone! While it’s called „subscribing”
to these services, it’s absolutely free! I’m still a newcomer in
this, The Verge mentions a few here
https://www.theverge.com/24295933/bluesky-social-network-custom-how-to
in „Labelers” section, but I’m using blocklists from this
trusted account https://bsky.app/profile/skywatch.blue
You gotta be careful, because some malicious actors are also creating
their own blocklists (I’ve even found myself on one of it). Make
sure to use blocklists from trusted users.
- This post from Lifehacker website explores some other ways that you
can protect yourself against trolls, like hiding replies from posts
(this is the feature that was totally „borrowed”, read: stolen by
Threads from Bluesky)
https://lifehacker.com/tech/the-best-tools-to-fight-the-trolls-on-bluesky
A popular philosophy on Bluesky is „block and don’t engage”.
We’re too tired of ruining our mental health by trolls. It’s not
a „discourse”.
https://medium.com/bouncin-and-behavin-blogs/bluesky-culture-why-we-block-and-dont-engage-9fe6e2e74eb5
Custom Feeds
Custom Feeds are another fun way to discover people and get more from
Bluesky. If you actually used a discovery feed on other websites –
Bluesky has it too, but it takes some time to get really good. But
why wait, when you can look for custom feeds for your interests?
„Feeds” section is on the left sidebar. You can find feeds for a
lot of subjects and communities and pin them on your homepage, next
to Following and Discover. There are also feeds for „Mutuals”
(accounts who follow you back), „Popular With Friends” and one
for Bluesky team. A lot of thematical feeds are automated, and by the
way, if you add a headphones emoji 🎧 to your post, it will be
automatically added to one of main music feeds, so that’s the way
to get noticed. If you use a film camera emoji 🎥 or use a term
„Filmsky”, your post will be added to the film feed.
If you wanna get more from the feeds, customize your own etc, you can use Graze
https://www.graze.social
Bookmarks
For the moment, Bluesky doesn't have a bookmark feature, which is probably its biggest flaw for me, but you can use a third-party tool. I like a simple-to-use extension Bluesky Bookmarks, which adds a bookmark button to a post (mind you - you can see it only if you open it a new tab, not in a feed) - and you can display the bookmark list through a button on your extensions sidebar. It's available on Chrome https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/bluesky-bookmarks/fabgnlmmiejaialmpojgmljacihchlga?hl=en and Firefox https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/bluesky-bookmarks/. Alternatively, you can use tools like https://kyst.app or https://savetobookmarks.com/
Scheduling Posts
If you want to schedule a post on Bluesky, you can use a schedule feature on deck.blue (see: Multi-Column View secion below)- or one of these services
https://usesaki.com/
https://www.blueskyscheduler.com
https://blueskylater.com
Advanced Search
If you find a default Bluesky search lacking, you should try this advanced search tool.
https://www.bskysrch.com/
Account Statistics
A couple of free tools to follow your Bluesky account growth (there are a couple more paid ones, if you're into that, to be found in Bluesky Directory)
https://bskyinsights.com/
https://blueview.app/
https://blueskycounter.com/
https://blueskymeter.com
Multi Column View
If you were an avid
Tweetdeck user, you may be looking for something similar on Bluesky.
Mastodon has it, Threads’ implementation is very poor. Bluesky has
a third party tool called Deck.Blue, which also offers some features
that weren’t added by the developers of regular Bluesky yet. For
more information, their website https://deck.blue/
Third Party Apps
The best way to discover Bluesky tools is to use Bluesky Directory. I've picked some of my personal favourites, but you can always find more on here: https://blueskydirectory.com/
Next to the official Bluesky apps, there are already a couple alternative clients. I mentioned Deck.Blue , but we also have:
Graysky (for Android) https://graysky.app/
Skeets (for iOS) https://www.skeetsapp.com/
Dragonfly (for MacOS/iPad) https://apps.apple.com/us/app/dragonfly-dfly/id6742131831
DarkSky (for Windows) https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9np22dtfscts
AtSky (alternative web app, like Deck.blue) https://atsky.app
Gridsky and Flashes (if you're more of an Instagram person and you're interested in a photo-based feed)
https://gridsky.social (not available yet) and https://apps.apple.com/us/app/flashes-for-bluesky/id6741443033 (Android version in works)
You can track your Bluesky unfollowers with this extension https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/skytrack-bluesky-follower/hojhgamikphdmpddlpdgggnjljgchiip
or dedicated Android app Bluesky Followers Analyzer
On bskycheck, you can track new users, including big organizations, government institutions etc
https://www.bskycheck.com/
There are also a couple additional services based on Bluesky/ATProto protocol, including:
https://stream.place/ for live streaming
https://blueskydirectory.com/clients/skylight TikTok alternative
Before you go...
That’s pretty much
all what I’ve wanted to share (and it’s much easier to share it
as a formated blog post than as a series of „skeets” – that’s
how Bluesky posts are called). But I’m sure I’ll have more on my
mind, I still have my Starter Packs to make – they will be added to
this post soon– so I’ll be editing. And again, I can
only hope for Bluesky’s growth and resistance to enshittification.
It’s not gonna be easy, but with this website, it’s already more
reliant on us and what we can do with it. I hope you will like
Bluesky, I hope you will stay on it and you will find it useful and
actually quite pleasant to use.
Oh, and you can
follow me here, if you like! Send me a feedback, tell me what else you wanna know!
https://bsky.app/profile/mavoyofficial.bsky.social
Image Source:
"Butterflies
are self propelled flowers. ~ R.H. Heinlein"
by VinothChandar is
licensed under CC
BY 2.0.
