30,000 signed up for Twitter’s decentralized social network project Bluesky

Bluesky tweeted yesterday that 30,000 people had joined the waiting list of its beta version. In a tweet, Bluesky informed that “Invites to the private beta” will be rolled out in stages to ensure that “the protocol scales and taking user feedback…”

What is Bluesky?

Twitter was supposed to become a decentralized social networking site which did not happen. So Twitter birthed Bluesky, to do exactly that.

Bluesky is a Public Benefit Limited Liability Corporation (PBLLC) established on February 7th, 2022. Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter, unveiled the project called Bluesky, envisioning a blockchain based decentralized social network in 2019.

As per Bluesky’s April 26 tweet it is an “independent company focused on decentralized social network R&D.” The initial team had 6 people including the team lead. Then Twitter CTO Parag Aggarwal hired the team lead Jay Graber. Other team members were hired by Graber.

How is it different from Twitter?

Dorsey revealed the Bluesky project in 2019. Initially, Twitter was expected to be a decentralized concept. It eventually became more and more centralized. Dorsey wrote that Twitter is not designed to deal with new challenges and to address those, a decentralized network was required.

“The value of social media is shifting away from content hosting and removal, and towards recommendation algorithms directing one’s attention. Unfortunately, these algorithms are typically proprietary, and one can’t choose or build alternatives. Yet,” he wrote. Centralized systems cannot deal with misinformation and abuse without burdening users.

Bluesky tweeted a thread explaining its relationship with Twitter. It said that the separation between the two companies was required to achieve the aim of creating a unique social networking site.

The decentralized social network is based on the Authenticated Transport Protocol or the “AT protocol.” According to its the Bluesky blog, the protocol will provide 3 unique features: one, users will be able to transfer data from one provider to another, without any data loss; two, the algorithm on which the site provides will be accessible to people – allowing control over what they see; three, the protocol will facilitate interoperability so that different applications can be used in the same ecosystem; and four, performance is fundamental to its infrastructure, so a smooth and fast interface is ensured.

Twitter’s misinformation problem

A 2018 MIT study found that on Twitter misinformation spreads faster than real news. “We found that falsehood diffuses significantly farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly than the truth, in all categories of information, and in many cases by an order of magnitude,” said Sinan Aral, the David Austin Professor of Management at MIT Sloan.

Elon Musk will reveal his decision on the $44 billion deal to buy Twitter on the 28th of this month. The billionaire wanted to buy Twitter to address its spam problem.

Some social networking sites hold enormous power in terms of user data. These companies make money using that data. With an open source website, data collection can be dealt with, effectively.