Social Media Housing

Despite trying to forge an alternative approach to self-publishing and consuming content in the past few months, I still want a real-time social media app. For better or worse, I don't think this format has been bettered for consuming news, be that tech, politics, or bodega cats. My problem is that these popular platforms are owned by plutocratic owners like Musk and Zuck, which makes me feel kinda uncomfortable, especially with the privately-owned and increasingly ugly X/Twitter.

Musk's recent political interference has sufficiently grated on me that I'm off Twitter for the large part, despite it being without question the best of the bunch in terms of critical mass and user experience. I'm a long term fan, so it's a shame to see what's happening to it but I'm not deleting my account because (a) I'm cybersquatting my handle and, (b) I live in hope that at some point in the future Musk will sell it and generous benefactors will resurrect it as Twitter and bring it into public ownership. Ha!

On the flip side, Meta is a public company, it doesn't feel that murky and Zuck doesn't seem quite as unhinged, for now. I really like using Instagram for my photography because there's a critical mass of people on there showing some incredible work, and people generally say nice things about my photos, which is very rewarding and makes me feel good. The ruthless Insta algorithm has actually been rather kind to that account, and my For You feed shows only photography and not that many ads or videos. I have a separate private Insta account which is great for following my actual real-life friends, but the algorithm punishes me with endless ads, unnervingly trained by snooping on my browser history. Still, the pros outweigh the cons so I continue to use it day-to-day.

Instagram isn't a real-time news platform though. For that, Meta has Threads. Since launching last year, in my experience Threads has been pretty useless. I hardly know anyone on it because only a tiny proportion of my Instagram friends have created a Threads account, and only a portion of them have ever posted. Until recently it seems to have been used mainly by celebs, influencers, and irritating brand accounts. In the past week though, due to Musk doubling-down on misinformation and flirting with the far right, a lot of journalists and media types have joined Threads, making it feel a bit more like a real-time platform. It's still not a patch on the Twitter of yore, but there are signs it could be.

Then there's Bluesky which seems to be much more of a Twitter clone than Threads. One key difference is that it's run as a public benefit corporation which feels like a very good thing to me. Yes we've had Mastodon for a while of course – open source and decentralised – but I've found that place even more factional than X, and it's simply far too confusing for mere mortals to understand. It has found a strong niche in Tech circles, but I think it will probably end its days there – the IRC of social media.

While Bluesky lacks critical mass and prominent accounts (although there are signs this is changing), it feels most like the good old days of Twitter. There are no ads (which to be fair, neither has Threads... but that onslaught is coming), and they hope to fund it through by-products like selling domains. I'm unconvinced this will work, but perhaps it could survive as a public utility with some premium features, or donations a la Wikipedia? Both Meta and X has shown people are willing to pay for social media for "verified" accounts, so why not?

Another thing in Bluesky's favour is the AT Protocol. This makes Bluesky federated and portable, which is a big positive. It also allows you to use a domain name as your handle, which solves the verification issues that plague Threads and X. I'm not sure how popular this will be for people (I don't think I want to be known as @headey.net... do I?), but it's certainly a neat feature for product accounts (see @feedgrab.net). I've also learned that each Bluesky profile has an RSS feed, which means I can follow some accounts in my preferred calmer way via Feedgrab. This is seriously cool, no?

I've got accounts on Bluesky as well as Threads, but I don't need both in the long run. I'm not some media personality who needs to "maximise reach". I just want a nice home for sharing links, memes and talking shop. There's a strong temptation to focus on Threads because there are so many people on there, but my gut says that Bluesky is a much more suitable home for me. Luckily I have virtually no followers and zero engagement on either platform, so I can't really get my choice wrong and, unlike the Betamax vs VHS wars, it's entirely possible for people to hedge their bets on these platforms for a while. So that's what I'll plan to do.