Bluesky, the decentralized alternative to Twitter, is now open to everyone 🦋

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Launched in November 2022, Bluesky, the social network of Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, was accessible by invitation only. But that system is now a thing of the past, and the platform is open to everyone.

Bluesky, Twitter’s in-house project, takes off🦋

You’re probably wondering what Bluesky is. Bluesky was originally an internal project at Twitter. The idea was to create a decentralized version of the social network. And now you’re probably wondering, « what exactly is a decentralized network. »

Twitter, Facebook and Instagram are what we call centralized networks. They’re owned and controlled by a single entity (usually a company) that decides everything about the network. We’re talking here about rules, features, moderation, data storage, and possibly censorship. By contrast, on decentralized networks, it’s much more the users who are in charge.

To help you understand, we can compare a centralized social network to a restaurant and a decentralized social network to a big picnic. When you go to a restaurant, you’re not free to choose where you sit. You don’t decide what’s on the menu, or how the food is served. In a picnic, for example, the opposite is true. Everyone decides what to bring, with whom and when to share. And you’re free to sit wherever you like.

The end of the invitation system 🥳

Until now, Bluesky has been available by invitation only. The idea behind this system was to limit the massive influx of new users, while the application’s functionalities were developed and improved. Since the end of this system on February 06, over a million new users have registered on the platform.

With this opening, a new competitor will attempt to recreate the magic of Twitter, after Meta’s Threads. However, even if Bluesky bears a striking resemblance to X (formerly Twitter), don’t expect to find all the features of its competitor. At the time of writing, it’s still impossible to share videos, make chain posts and so on. There’s still a long way to go for the platform, but opening up is already an important step.