Every person and organization has to make their own decisions about which social platforms they will have an account on, publish their content to, engage with, and support (with use or contributions both time and financial).
There is no right answer for everyone. And, to many that run an online business, hoping to capture the attention of just enough customers to remain sustainable, perhaps they shouldn’t care at all and just publish everywhere.
However.
I think it is a mistake for many of us (individually) to support social platforms that are built and grown on venture capital with the promise to provide outsized returns to investors. We have enough history to show us that model is highly unfavorable. Communities should financially support the social platforms they want to exist and use.
Yes, have your own website. Yes, publish there first and syndicate that content to any other platforms that you choose. At this point, this should be standard practice for both people and organizations in my opinion.
But also, if you can afford to be choosey… perhaps start choosing platforms that we know have our best interests in mind, that support the open web, and that won’t rug pull the moment they need to.
In Re: Bluesky, published in mid-November which seems like 7 years ago now, I mentioned that I have my reservations about the organization. I think AT Protocol has some interesting things in it. I think the platform and client app also are doing some interesting things. But, they are raising money again. And with Meta’s recent policy changes causing a-yet-brand-new exodus from their platforms recently, I see people running to Bluesky and I must admit I’m a little baffled. Why jump from a Meta backed service to a VC-backed one? Bluesky’s debt to investors is already at a point that no other business model other than advertising (and we know where that leads) makes any sense.
The truth is I do know why… follower counts. People are still chasing follower counts. Mastodon (which may not be perfect but the model is far more attractive and sustainable than anything else out there right now) isn’t growing at the pace Bluesky is and so people aren’t even considering it. That is a shame. If a few million people found a cozy instance to settle into, supported it and the Mastodon project with a few dollars here and there, they’d have the web they want.
I don’t want to be reactionary. I try not to be. And I work on a social sharing plugin so my livelihood is based on the success and failure of all of these platforms. However, for me personally, I think I need to start being choosier in the services that I visit on daily basis. To that end, I’m going to be removing some apps from my mobile devices and visiting those platforms far less. And focusing on RSS and Mastodon and making larger contributions to their sustainability.
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