Following the US elections, Bluesky has made a name for itself in the social media world with a remarkable increase in users. While the number of users of the platform exceeded 24 million, this growth brought with it significant challenges and strategic decisions. Committed to providing an ad-free social media experience, Bluesky is reshaping its infrastructure and services to cope with increasing user demand.
Bluesky CEO Jay Graber explained the platform’s main goals and future plans in his speech at WIRED’s Big Interview event held in San Francisco last Tuesday. Graber stated that Bluesky wants to continue growing by prioritizing user experience and that they will definitely not adopt a revenue model based on advertisements.
Ad-free income plan with subscription model
Bluesky’s revenue model is designed to rely on users subscribing to premium services offered on the platform. Graber stated that paid services such as high-quality video upload or user-specific customization options are planned. However, the recent unexpected user influx has delayed the implementation of these plans. Graber said, “Our plan was in this direction, but the large increase in the number of users caused us to postpone this process,” and conveyed the difficulties brought by this situation.
The platform’s rapid growth was triggered by users looking for an alternative social media platform, especially after Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. Following the US elections in November, Bluesky attracted millions of new users not only as a technical innovation but also as an alternative away from political rhetoric.
Bluesky’s full-time team of 20 people faced an intense workload in parallel with the increase in users. Although the platform experienced access problems several times during this period, the company strengthened its technical infrastructure and increased its content moderation capacity. Graber emphasized that the number of contracted personnel working for content moderation was increased from 25 to 100, and thus the platform now offers a more stable service.
In addition, Bluesky stands out with the customization and control features it offers to its users. Users can shape their own content experiences with tools such as start lists and word muting. Users with more technical knowledge can add a different dimension to the operation of the platform by setting up their own servers. These features stand out as part of Bluesky’s decentralized structure.
This rapid rise of Bluesky led other social media giants to update their strategies. Threads, Meta’s Twitter/X alternative, announced that it gained 35 million new users in November. Meta announced that it plans to add more customization options to sustain this increase. This situation signals that the competition between Bluesky and Threads will become even more intense.
Although Bluesky differentiates itself by offering an ad-free social media experience, it is not yet clear whether this model will be sustainable in the long term. In this field where competition is intense, Bluesky continues to attract attention with its user-friendly features and innovative revenue models. The future path of the platform is closely followed in the social media world.
At this point, it is worth noting that you can also follow Teknoblog on Bluesky. You can access our official account by clicking here.