From Bluesky to Blacksky

Recently I moved from Bluesky to Blacksky. What does that even mean? Many people, especially on Twitter/X, denigrate Bluesky as being nothing more than a left-wing version of X, only more toxic and less popular. But this is confusing the surface for the substrate, and judging the qualities of the latter based on the appearance of the former—like gauging a person’s health based on their tattoos. In this post I look beneath the skin and discuss a key aspect of the body underneath. (I hope to cover other aspects in future posts.)

So, again, what does it mean to move from Bluesky to Blacksky? Well, it’s not like moving from X to Threads, or from Instagram to Mastodon. I can still see all the posts of the people I follow, and they can see mine. Anything I liked or reposted before is still liked or reposted same as always, ditto for my replies to others’ posts. Even my handle has not changed; I was @frankhecker.com on Bluesky, and I’m still @frankhecker.com now that I’ve moved.

This is possible because in the world of Bluesky,¹ everything I do is stored in a way that is not unique or proprietary to Bluesky (as, in contrast, my tweets on X are locked inside X’s servers). I can pick up my posts, my likes, my replies and reposts, and everything else, and move them to a new host, in very much the same way as when I buy a new laptop and move my files over from my old laptop. What is mine stays mine, and does not change in any relevant way.

So, when I say that I moved from Bluesky to Blacksky, I mean that the bundle containing all the collections of my posts, likes, etc.,² was previously hosted on a server³ run by Bluesky PBC (the company that created the Bluesky service) and is now hosted on a server run by Blacksky Algorithms (an organization that, in its own words, “builds open-source, community-driven infrastructure for decentralized social media”).

When I make a post or like, re-post, or quote-post someone else’s post, that action is reflected in my data stored on the Blacksky server infrastructure. From there it is picked up by other systems⁴ and aggregated with posts, likes, etc., from other people by yet other systems⁵ to create the unified view of posts, likes, etc., that I and everyone else can see. The original versions of these other systems were hosted by Bluesky PBC, but alternate versions can be (and in the case of Blacksky, are) hosted by others.

You may now have an obvious question: “Why should you care where your data is hosted? By your own admission, moving it didn’t really change anything.” This is why:

First, I’m interested in the technical underpinnings of the Bluesky service. The ability to transparently move your data from one hosting provider to another is touted as a technical advantage of those underpinnings, and I wanted to try it out for myself.

Second, the ability to move your data provides insurance against possible problems with a given hosting provider. For example, if Bluesky PBC were to go out of business or curtail some of their services, being on Blacksky’s infrastructure could (at least in theory) insulate me from any ensuing issues. And it works the same way in reverse: If Blacksky Algorithms were to fail then (at least in theory) I could just move back to Bluesky.⁶

Third, I believe in the maxim that “if you’re not the customer, you’re the product.” I’d rather pay for a service that hosts a key aspect of my online presence, just as I pay for my personal website and domain name. Bluesky PBC is a VC-funded company that is providing a “free” service and as yet has no clear path to monetization. On the other hand, Blacksky Algorithms offers an easy way to pay them for their services, and as it happened I was already funding them for other reasons, as discussed below. Taking advantage of their hosting gave me one more reason to do so.

FInally, I also believe in the value of small-scale experiments, of systems created by and rooted in the communities they serve, and of cooperative ventures that attempt to live and thrive in the space between donor-funded nonprofits and VC-funded corporations. Blacksky Algorithms struck me as an organization with a clear mission, a growing track record of successful implementation, competent leadership, and a commitment to financial transparency and community feedback. That had previously led me to help fund them on a monthly basis, and when I moved my user data over I took the opportunity to increase my subscription.

Moving my personal data also prompted me to look more closely at the possibilities enabled by the protocols and technologies underlying Bluesky, Blacksky, and related services. I’ll have more to say about that in my next post.

If you’d like to read more

• The Blacksky Algorithms website has a good overview of the organization’s mission, products and services, and current team.
• Blacksky Algorithms also provides very detailed information on the organization’s finances, if you want to see where your money will be going if you help fund Blacksky.
• If you’re on Bluesky and want to move your data to Blacksky, see the documentation on migrating. (If you’re not already on Bluesky, you can sign up for Blacksky directly; see the migration document for details.)
• “Open Social” by Dan Abramov (@danabra.mov on Bluesky) is a (mostly) non-technical discussion of what differentiates Bluesky and Bluesky-compatible services (like Blacksky) from traditional social networks like Twitter/X.
• “Where It’s at://” and “A Social Filesystem” by the same author go into more technical detail regarding the technologies and protocols underlying Bluesky and Blacksky.