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Getting started on Bluesky, Greater Boston edition

By adamg on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 10:25am

Bluesky, a social platform that feels like Twitter circa 2014 (so, yay), seems to have really taken off the past week. Of course, the hardest thing about signing up on a new platform is finding people to follow. Folks on Bluesky have assembled a series of "starter packs" - collections of accounts to follow on specific topics - and there are several of possible interest to people in Boston and the Boston area:

Neighborhoods: 
Boston
Cambridge
Somerville
Free tagging: 
Bluesky


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Comments

By lbb on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 10:44am.

bsky is great. The block tools are amazing, and that makes it possible to actually have useful conversations.

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By adamg on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 10:50am.

Yeah, it's such a change from the bird site (where the block tool was eviscerated a couple months back, anyway).

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By Frelmont on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 11:58am.

It’s nice to have alternatives to the devils’ bargains: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok &c., &c…

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By Don't Panic on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 12:48am.

I had to sign up for Facebook because of something work related. I'm not much of a social media users unless posting to sites like this counts.

Does it; Is this social media too?

By Frelmont on Wed, 11/13/2024 - 1:58pm.

I took the liberal view that any form of medium can be a social medium and UH is a kind of social media limited to the headline. I guess in the common parlance “social media” is limited to the dominant firms. Also, if UH has a presence, a whaddaya call it, profile? account? on a larger platform…, but I don’t know if comments are visible there.

By pawl on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 12:00pm.

I am a long time fan and really glad to see you make the jump and help bring people along. Ed Markey, Michelle Wu, city councilors, reps, press, all getting active these last few days, it’s very encouraging.

I also have a quick guide on finding your old Twitter follows pinned to my profile. Found 1200+ of my own last night: https://bsky.app/profile/pawlbologna.bsky.social/post/3lahaxe6us42y

Full disclosure that I work for Mayor Wu and used to work for Markey. I’m not paid by bsky, but I think safe and productive online spaces are very important, especially with X becoming an official arm of the Trump White House. See you all over there

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By statler1 on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 12:37pm.

Does anyone know Dave Epstein personally? Is there any way we can coax him over to Bluesky?
Jeremy Reiner is great and all but he doesn't post that often.

By adamg on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 7:08pm.

Looks like he's started posting on Bluesky again.

https://bsky.app/profile/growinwsdom.bsky.social

By Zhu Hengpeng on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 1:38pm.

The last time everyone left Twitter was after Musk bought it.

By Angry Dan on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 1:48pm.

I used the Sky Follower Bridge extension to follow the same accounts and was pleasantly surprised to find over a third of them were already there.

It looks like a mass migration is well underway and I immediately saw skeets from multiple accounts about their follower counts rising rapidly too. So I'm going to keep the Twitter account alive and run the extension again in the near future to see if I can follow others once they jump ship.

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By Kathode on Mon, 11/11/2024 - 3:02pm.

For the Sky Follower Bridge tip!

By BostonDog on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 7:17am.

Mastodon was the small form social media darling (Twitter alternative) and for good reason since it isn't controlled by a corporation that can pivot on a dime. Blue sky isn't new, why are people just switching to it now? Didn't anyone who cares about Musk and his politics abandon Twitter years ago?

FWIW, people further retreating into left/right based social media realms doesn't seem like a positive change in net. (I say as someone who steadfastly avoids social media.)

By Tim Mc. on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 8:44am.

Bluesky just took a huge amount of VC money from some skeevy cryptocurrency concern, so the enshittification is locked in at this point. Should start seeing it in a year or two, and then there will be a lot of Shocked Pikachu faces.

Maybe Bluesky has a better onboarding experience (because there's only one of it, centrally controlled)? Could just be a critical mass thing, though, and if enough people start moving in one direction it reduces movement towards other options. There has definitely been some population increase in Mastodon land as well, but maybe not as much.

But yeah, I have questions about people who were still hanging out at the Nazi Bar.

By Paul Schlichtman on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 9:20am.

I have been on BlueSky for the past seven months, not much activity. Suddenly, the traffic is building and I am seeing enough traffic to pay attention to it. It might ramp up to the point where there's a critical mass of content.
Search tools are primitive, so I get a ton of Arlington VA when looking for neighbors in Massachusetts, so I started a Starter Pack.
https://go.bsky.app/KCWed8T

By lbb on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 9:50am.

FWIW, people further retreating into left/right based social media realms doesn't seem like a positive change in net.

Because engaging with people who hate you is a positive thing. Right.

By BostonDog on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 10:51am.

Block the trolls but it's possible to disagree with someone without thinking they are a horrible person who should be figuratively shoved into a hole.

Even on Uhub, there are people who I tend to disagree with but I don't mind reading their posts. (Plus a few trolls I'd like to see blocked.)

By lbb on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 11:53am.

Block the trolls but it's possible to disagree with someone without thinking they are a horrible person who should be figuratively shoved into a hole.

Pick up your straw. Nobody is owed a platform, and nobody is owed an audience.

By BostonDog on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 1:06pm.

You have no obligation to listen to anyone.

Personally, I like to read well written opinions and discussion from people I generally disagree with just so I know what other people are thinking. Like this thread, for example.

By lbb on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 2:12pm.

The people that I most disagree with these days appear to be living in a non-fact-based universe. It is hard to conceive of such people producing "well-written opinions and discussion". And even good writing can be, and often is, based on deeply flawed premises.

By Frelmont on Wed, 11/13/2024 - 2:20pm.

Case in point: the brave Congressman Seth Moulton who stands against intolerance and the Ministry of Thoughtlanguage, Newspeak.

By adamg on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 9:21am.

Marc Levy at Cambridge Day, who hasn't posted to Twitter since November, 2022, explains.

It was shocking to me how long people and organizations stayed on the former Twitter, saying there was some benefit or a good to be accomplished. But the site is weighted toward disinformation, misinformation and hate. The very basis of the app – “free speech” in a “town square” – is a transparent lie. If you’re looking to win hearts and minds, you’d be as well off contributing earnest letters to the editor at The Daily Stormer.

By cybah on Tue, 11/12/2024 - 1:39pm.

I was there when there were less than 100k people.

I left in July. In fact, I left all social media in July.

Initially bsky was a nice alternative to twitter. But eventually it turned into twitter minus Elon and the nazi's. Endless fighting, one up posts, trolling, and more. It just became a cesspool.

It was at that point where I realized that anywhere there is a 'feed', it's just going to get toxic. It doesn't matter if its IG, bsky, twitter, or facebook. Its all the same. This format just isn't good for ourselves and society. It doesn't help and just draws division.

In the nearly six months I haven't been on a social media.. a lot has happened. I read more books. I spend more time hanging with people in person. I talk on the telephone more. I watch more TV. I do more projects around my house. Overall I am more active.

Its been a very positive experience, even my mental health is far better than it has been in years. I really wish social media would just go away... even if its for a few months. Just so people could be forced to take a step back and realize how awful it really is.

And considering what's to come policially in this country, I think we need this more than ever.