Nov 24, 2024 3 min read

Bluesky Verified

There remains an economic and technological barrier; yes ...

But the game has been leveled considerably, nonetheless.

Essentially all you need is a domain name of your own ... you add a TXT record (to be technical ... it's not difficult.) And then boom, that's your handle on the social network!

Apparently it's called the AT Protocol; apparently developed by Bluesky ... go figure.

Regardless, if you've got a domain, you can be just as verified as the other real celebrities.

We'll see if it catches on

Decentralized Protocols

That's the hypeword decentralized; which is meant to signify sovereignty and autonomy in the digital world ... more buzzwords; most recently used in the crypto-space.

Though in many respects, Bluesky has accomplished this crypto-goal; without using crypto.

As we all take a collective sigh of relief.

Moving on ... the intent of social media websites is to keep people on the app; and then sell them ads while collecting data to sell to advertisers.

For Bluesky to push against even this archaic aim, they could make verified handles clickable – curiously enough, one wouldn't even need to leave the app to view the webpage.

Anywho, here's my profile on the app: https://bsky.app/profile/dreamfreely.org

Pretty nifty to have my URL as my handle ... and it's like, ok, so someone makes the fake profile @canincarlos.bsky.app ... I'm not well known, and even if I was; you'd almost know it was a fake because clean handles are netiquette preference since forever.

NexTech

Bluesky is very much Twitter2.0; but ... the app isn't the primary product, perhaps.

The protocol is the product ... for all intents and purposes, tech is cheap; whether it's drive space, or labor hours; the cost is insignificant at this point.

But what makes money?

Advertising and data used to ... but now ... it's interaction, it's energy, essentially.

Step 1) Apps want you to stay on their platform.
Step 2) Users want their time back.
Step 3) Apps need to have a specific purpose, and serve only that.
Step 4) Users don't like apps that entrap them on the platform.

And this is a culture shift; rumor has it the GenZ wants things more traditional, for better or for worse.

Back to the econ-side; where does this leave social technology?

Opinion: money won't be made on advertising, but helping to manage protocols that keep people connected, efficiently, and perhaps even, transparently.

Advertising will be created organically on these information highways.