Former Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey has launched his new social media app Bluesky on the apple App Store.
The Bluesky idea started brewing while Dorsey was Twitter CEO and had even received funding from Twitter but Dorsey only went public about it shortly after his exit from Twitter in November 2021.
In a tweet on the 25th April 2022, Bluesky said it had received $13million to ensure it has freedom and independence to start on R&D and also hinted about the former CEO being on board as well as a former Twitter security engineer joining the team.
Responding to whether the previous Twitter funding would mean both apps will be intertwined, Dorsey said, “Twitter’s funding of Bluesky is not subject to any conditions except one; that Bluesky is to research and develop technologies that enable open and decentralized public conversation.”
When a user creates a handle, the username appears in the format @username.bsky.social for example, a user named Oluwafemi will have username as @oluwafemi.bsky.social.
A Bluesky user’s profile contains a profile picture, background, bio, and metrics like number of followers, number of following, and number of posts.
Bluesky comes with a simplified interface where a user can create a post of 256 characters including photos by simply clicking on a “plus” button. Posts can be liked, replied to, reposted and reported. They can also be shared to other apps or copied as texts.
Users can search for and follow other users’ accounts, view their updates in a Home timeline, as well as share, mute and block accounts.
Describing her Bluesky experience, Sarah Perez wrote on Tech Crunch, “There is something ironic about leaving Twitter to use an app that looks and feels so much like Twitter…”
She concluded, “…Bluesky’s larger promise is the new underpinning technology of the AT protocol, but the app itself feels like a stripped down Twitter.”
Bluesky is presently in the testing phase and is strictly based on invitation to the platform, but it’s App Store appearance hints it may be opening to the general public soon.
The Bluesky iOS debuted on Feb 17th 2023 and has gathered over 2000 installs based on its invite-only status but the app is not yet available on Google play store.
