Beyond the Blue #3
Welcome to the 3rd issue of Beyond the Blue -The week in Bluesky!
There is no discussion that the highlight of last week was the introduction of custom feeds on Bluesky. This feature has significantly enhanced the discoverability and engagement across various topics, networks of people, and interests. In my opinion, there is big room for improvement in the Bluesky app on feeds discoverability and the UX of the crowdsourced curation (through users' likes), looking forward to future developments!
It's interesting to see that the custom feeds have been successfully implemented by various projects (even Flipboard!), even before the official release inside the Bluesky app! To me, this serves as a clear signal that Bluesky is now an open-source project with a vibrant community. This is the take of Paul (Bluesky core dev), on that.
Besides that, I also came across this mutelist created by @col.bsky.social, which, I think, is a great way to mute corporate accounts while....also to discover companies joining Bluesky! 😂
Ah, and make sure to take a peek at the Featured Apps section, cause this week I've got featured two incredible no-code tools to play with custom feeds and handles!
I hope you enjoy this newsletter. If you do, please share it on Bluesky and among your friends!
News
Building in the open is a great way to see the future! Like this PR, by @mozzius.dev, that will soon be integrated into Bluesky, enabling post translations into user's system language, not just English like it's currently happening
Since this week, preview cards appear on posts when you share a link on Bluesky! One of the most bothersome issues that has finally been solved 🔥!
Also, Bluesky Web now features automatic detection of your system's dark-light configuration and adjusts accordingly. We can expect to see this functionality in the iOS/Android app very soon as well!
As Bluesky grows, there is an exponential need for moderation and to take decisions. Check out this thread by Bluesky's CEO, Jay Graber, addressing the issue as some problems have emerged involving personal attacks and hate speech. It's primal to have empathy for the people who have to manage it, as moderation is always an ongoing task that can be particularly challenging to navigate, especially when it involves ambiguous language or the rules are not clear.
An interesting take by @salarrahmanian.bsky.social on how bot accounts and accounts that mass-follow users are ruining the Bluesky UX.
Curious about how the "What's hot" algorithm differs from "What's Hot Classic"? Paul explains it in simple terms.
Featured Articles
Is Bluesky Billionaire-proof? by @micahflee, an extensive article that delves into various politically significant topics for AT Proto and Bluesky, as they determine the future of the protocol and the social network: project ownership, legal structure, revenue model, and more.
Bluesky — is everyone getting along?, an interesting article that analyzes blocking interactions among current Bluesky users.
Bluesky vs. Nostr — Which Should Developers Care About More?, an article that compares Nostr and Bluesky for devs and brings a great reflection: the current state of the Bluesky ecosystem resembles the early days of the Twitter API-based projects.
Bluesky now lets you choose your own algorithm by @karissabe.bsky.social, a friendly article introducing and discussing the new Bluesky custom feeds.
Featured Apps
Community Handles: allows you to deploy a UI to give away Bluesky handles under your domain. It's the software behind Swifties.social, and it's maintained by @mozzius.dev.
Contrails: It was a matter of time before a no-code tool for creating custom feeds appeared.. Contrails is an AT Proto custom feed generator built using Cloudflare Workers + Bsky Search (Palomar). It can be deployed with GitHub Actions! Maintained by @jcsalterego.bsky.social. We can see more developments in that direction soon.
Don't forget that you can find more apps, tools and clients in the Bluesky Community Hub.
Featured Skeet
Bluesky Stats
Number of users: 103,066 (+11,623)
Number of skeets: 3,360,000 (+710,000)
Data extracted from Jaz's Bluesky stats on 01-06-2023
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