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A multi media push for Bluesky is happening today.
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=Bluesky&iar=news&ia=news
Currently listening to BBC radio news with guests talking about "is X over?" To their credit the host is offering some criticism of the move and the possible motives.
Is X over? Is this push organic, or coordinated? Are journalists helping contribute to a more positive platform, or are they running away to a hugbox in an effort to punish Elon Musk for supporting Donald Trump?
I don't have much to say but I thought this was worth a post given these platforms' centrality to the internet culture war and its synergies with journalism. For my part I've always thought Twitter was shit, is shit, and will remain shit, and the same goes for any copycats adopting the same format. I lament the drop off of RSS, which suffered from terrible branding/awareness. I didn't understand the value of RSS until it was already in decline, dismissing it as just more icon clutter below a standard format blogpost next to Facebook, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Del.icio.us and send-to-email share links.
Twitter's rise began with journalists hailing it as the beginning of "citizen journalism", plateaued with it becoming a journalism circlejerk of mutual citationogenics they could profitably mine for clickbait from the comfort of their pillows with no need to undertake difficult tasks like research and real world reportage, and is now being abandoned as those same citizen journalists have increasingly turned against the professional journalist class who lauded them. Reap what you sow, Frankenstein's monster, the student has become the master, etc...
Is it a coincidence this is happening on a Friday night? Sunday night is the typical slot for setting a news agenda for the week, but something like Bluesky might be more suited to a weekend when people would be settling down to a relaxing night of shitposting.
I joined Bluesky yesterday out of curiosity. I haven’t stopped using Twitter, nor am I planning to at this time, but I’ll be posting on Bluesky, whereas I pretty much exclusively lurk on Twitter. Bluesky seems to be trying to optimize for a more amiable, relaxed experience, and hopefully the lack of chuds brigading people’s posts to call them Jewish faggots will contribute to that goal.
I have become acutely aware of my own radicalization as of late, and honestly I think it would be beneficial for me - both socially and intellectually - to reacclimate myself with intelligent libs, and to attempt honest and mutually-open-minded dialogue with them. I can do that here on The Motte, but the extreme selection effects and barriers to entry here mean that I’m not getting a lot of exposure to what actually-existing normie liberals and left-centrists are saying amongst themselves. I’ve already followed some arts- and gaming-related content creators on Bluesky, and my hope is that it will not just turn into a rebirth of pre-Elon Twitter where all of my favorite celebrities churn out 24/7 liberal outrage-posting.
That being said, on my very first day on Bluesky, some random rotund they/them woman apparently found my inaugural post briefly explaining why I voted for Trump, and the following exchange occurred:
So yes, some libs are very obviously planning for Bluesky to be a progressive hugbox where the left gets to regain complete ironclad control of the discourse, including leftists just being able to straight-up fedpost at people, in a way they’d never want RWers to get away with.
That said, I’m going to try and stick it out and see what I can contribute to conversations. If this exhange had happened on Twitter, as soon as she made her comment about “we can carry as well” I would have just made a mean-spirited joke about how I feel bad for the poor schmucks who have to try and carry her. I’m trying to be on my best behavior on Bluesky, though, and to use it as though Twitter had Motte-level expectations of charity and genteel discourse. Basically trying to recreate the vibe of in-person SSC/rationalist meet-ups back when I used to attend them, but with the added wrinkle that at least some moderately important content creators and companies are also there.
If you wish to avoid radicalization, wouldn't it be best to stay away from social media entirely? Or you can think for yourself like I do (this will likely put you out of sync with most people, but you will have a sane view on things)
By the way, that person clearly had nothing of value to offer you. She's some brand of mentally unwell (I'd say stupid, but she seems lucid and I don't notice any typos). There may be people worth interacting with on that site, but I think it's a bit cruel to yourself to interact with somebody that you know will waste your time and treat you badly, and giving them the benefit of doubt.
I've only seen Bluesky on Japanese Twitter so far, so I thought it was Japanese, in which case it would be somewhat safe from a political takeover. But now that I Google it, it seems like it's American. I'd recommend you don't get too attached to the site (in other words, mentally tag your account as throwaway so that leaving or getting banned won't affect you too badly in the future)
I mean my radicalization has already taken place, and my goal is to try and wrench myself a bit back in the direction of being able to intellectually interface with the normal, left-of-center people in my immediate social scene.
Although many of my specific beliefs and policy positions are very right-wing (for at least some value of what that term means) I’m still dispositionally an effete urban lib-brained aesthete. My natural coalition is other city-dwelling academic types, who want to live in clean and orderly and fairly sterile large cities; I’m not going to reinvent myself as a salt-of-the-earth red-blooded American who Works With His Hands™️.
My current strategy of just keeping my mouth shut about politics and letting people assume I’m a standard-issue lib is only tenable as long as I commit to a sort of detached insincerity; I’d prefer to return to a time when I could just be honest and intimate with close friends, even about controversial subjects. Part of that might be aided by a general “vibe shift” in the culture which will pull those people away from some of their more extreme stances, but I’m not holding my breath for that. In the meantime I want to try and find ways to present my own ideas to people in a way that doesn’t just immediately trigger their enemy detection alarms. Maybe posting on Bluesky, which has an old-school Twitter-style character limit, will help me succinctly defend my views in a way that doesn’t require massive amounts of careful elaboration.
So, yes, it’s very obvious that I have nothing to gain from this person, and that I can run circles around her intellectually. However, that interaction did provide me with an opportunity to occupy the role of “reasonable person reacting with bemused concern at the extreme rhetoric of my interlocutor” - a position which I’m normally on the reverse end of in lib-majority spaces. My hope is that the vibe shift can be helped along by people like me showing up in such spaces, proving we don’t have horns, and making a common-sense case against the more radically stupid positions that the “smart center” might be ready to jettison. Having such an easy and clearly-delusional foil in this scenario was helpful for me!
Believe me, anything I post under the “Hoffmeister25” brand is inherently disposable; I’m prepared to have my social media accounts nuked from on high at any time, and Bluesky is certainly no exception.
How sane is bluesky? Because I imagine interacting with far-out people wouldn't be great for depolarization. I'd think the best place would be moderate lefties, perhaps?
I’m still getting a feel for it, but to be honest early observations are very concerning. A lot of academics just spouting extremely simplistic leftist takes. I’m trying to see how my pushback is received. I’m sure I’ll have more observations later.
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