I think I followed everyone!
Just joined @ripiphorus with a cuckoo wasp profile picture
Okay, I’ve heard things about Bluesky to the effect that it is intended to be a “nice” place for those escaping the toxicity of X. On the other hand, the one and only reason I have stayed with Facebook is because that is where my family and people I know IRL are. Having some time ago realized that online forums and such were taking over too much of my time, I cut out all except these iNaturalist Forums and my families’ and friends’ Facebook pages.
So, question: is there a way to look on Bluesky to see if people I know IRL are there? I really don’t want to add another venue for collecting online-only friends, but if people I already know are someplace other than Facebook, I would like that better.
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Take this with a big grain of salt because I have never been a user of bluesky (people who do use it can correct me if I’m wrong), but from what I’ve heard about bluesky it’s primarily used by people who left Xitter for political reasons, and functions as yet another online echo chamber for political content. Their front page, which is visible without an account, is almost all political stuff. So idk if I’d exactly call it a “nice” or “positive” Xitter alternative.
Social media in general breeds toxicity, by its very design. I quit entirely five years ago (except for occasional use of niche sites like this forum) and haven’t regretted it once
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@ben-travaglini.bsky.social
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It’s nice in comparison to Twitter. People are more likely to block or mute than argue, and there are far fewer bots and ads. It does lean strongly left and there is a lot of politics, which does not bother me. But, if that’s not your thing, then mute political accounts and look for nature accounts or art or literature or education, etc. You can opt into lists that are directed toward specific interests like EduSky or BookSky. Your experience is kind of what you make it. I can’t promise you won’t ever see people discussing politics, but as I said, you can limit what you see and from whom you see it.
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I can’t think of a way for you to see if people you know are there unless you know their handles–then you can search for them. Otherwise, I would say probably not. I will add that I’ve only been using it since December, so I may not know what I’'m talking about entirely. :)
Thanks for doing this!
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You’re all welcome to come find me at mercedes-fletcher.bsky.social! :)
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I congratulate you (sincerely), and your points are well taken. I do want to reminisce that long, long ago Twitter had a really fun sci-comm community. I think it was mostly grad students, but they would post games (Cougar or Not? was one) and citizen science opportunities. I was required to have the account for work. I need to delete it now that the supervisor who mandated that was gone. But they were lovely, and I miss that.
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Yeah it really is too bad that fun stuff like that gets swamped by the massive flood of political outrage bait and mudslinging on social media. I know it’s easy to say you can just ignore that type of content or only follow the “fun” stuff, but social media sites are specifically designed to recommend and promote the outrage bait, because that’s what gets lots of engagement. Human nature is such that it’s often very tempting for us to engage with such content when we see it, and social media companies know that fact and use it for their own profit
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I’m not too informed as I am not on blue sky, but I think one of the specialties of blue sky is that you can have a feed that you curate made up of those you follow without any external recommendations. This is counter most of the other major social media platforms where it is almost impossible to have a feed without any algorithmic influence.
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Yep! No algorithm shoving crap at you. It’s very nice!
Yes, I appreciate this aspect of Bluesky, which is baked into the design, though I myself am still getting the hang of actually taking advantage of it.
https://bsky.app/profile/thesheepcat.bsky.social
Part of my profile there:
Come for the bugs and flowers and occasional topical verse; stay for a vision of human flourishing: faith and reason, dialogue, democracy. “Truth and love need each other.”
Oh!! I’d love to connect with other iNatters over there. I am @natrlover1975.bsky.social
Yay! Off to check out everyone else.
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Would also love to connect with other iNatters on Bluesky! I’m [at]bradleyallf.bsky.social
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Hey, Owl Person! I’ve always been curious about you. Fellow Owl IDer
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