Bluesky Is the Small Comfort I'd Been Looking For. Let's Hope It Lasts

I'd felt adrift for years. When I appeared on podcasts or TV spots and people asked where to follow me, other than to recommend checking out CNET.com, I said I don't know. Come find me on a park bench, I joked once. Social media exploded into a galaxy of fragments a few years ago, around when Elon Musk bought Twitter, and it's never been the same since. Bluesky was one of many Twitter-alikes, including Threads, that emerged in 2023 to make the landscape seem more confusing than it had ever been.

I'm not here to talk about social network economics or the political dynamics of all the disturbing things Musk has done. I'm here to talk about feeling alone. In the pandemic, I had to rediscover what it meant to connect with others, leaning on whatever remote technology I could patch together. Nothing was a perfect solution, but apps like Twitter were a thread of sorts in a threadbare world. Do I just meet people in my neighborhood, create personal Discord channels, text old friends, find comfort in my family? Admit that the nature of the world is fragmented anyway?

I found Bluesky again in mid-October this year, a few weeks ahead of its massive viral rise this November. I created a Bluesky account back in 2023 when it launched, around the same time as Meta's Threads appeared, and when I also made a Mastodon account. It was all too much and not enough. These new places felt empty. I sent a few messages here and there, and wandered away.

I started using Threads, which is Meta's Twitter alternative. It was… fine, but not great. Threads became popular last year, but I couldn't stand how the app – and X, as Twitter is now known, for that matter – made algorithmically gathered suggested feeds the primary thing I'd see. Instead of friends and interesting individuals that I'd chosen to follow and support for their insights, I got random viral garbage posts that felt as empty as the Instagram content that made me ditch that app, too.

I came back to Bluesky as a little cry for help, sort of. I only had about 200-something followers, but some were people I knew well. I wrote a few little messages, and my friends responded. Just a couple. It made me happier than I'd been in months. And it made me wonder… what did I really need?

Earlier this year, I directed a reading of a play I wrote recently, just a small thing. Maybe 35 people came to see it. And it was the best little thing I've done for myself in a long time. I found the connection between people – local actors, and friends who came to see it – was the real communication that I, as a middle-aged dad in suburbia, need. Instead of sending little message-bottles out into vast social oceans, I found fewer but more meaningful rewards from just a handful of people.

Bluesky's joys: Small but accelerating

Bluesky isn't the same as seeing people in person. It's just another social network. Founded by former Twitter employees, it seems to have a good heart. It's also devoid of distancing algorithms or intrusive ads. Hopefully that'll be forever, but forever is hard to judge in tech.

A recent tidal wave of interest in Bluesky has shot the app full of new people, and lots of follower growth. Mark Hamill is there now, and Stephen King, and George Takei, and Joyce Carol Oates (a former professor of mine who was nice enough to follow me back recently), and lots of others I found on Twitter before. And I'm gathering followers, surprisingly, much faster than I ever did on Threads. It's still a tenth of the followers I had on X, but I'd be happy with even half of what it is now.

How did my follower count grow so fast? I ended up on some Starter Packs, Bluesky's system of making follower lists that anyone can share easily with everyone else. A few VR/AR and immersive theater communities were kind enough to add me, and many others seem kind about their adds as well. It's led to a lot of people being focused on discovering people instead of viral, disembodied posts. Or so I think.

It's addictive to see my numbers go up. Too addictive, maybe. I'm seeing notifications from Bluesky nearly constantly, and I keep peeking to see what else is going on, who has responded, who's following me now, who else I can follow. It reminds me of those old Twitter days. But I step back and also tell myself, remember that your best early days of Bluesky back in October were just about finding a few people to acknowledge, nod at across the divide, and feel encouraged by. I like the joys of a few simple connections. I don't want to be viral. I don't want to be obsessed with numbers or followers. I just want to find a couple of places where I can be me, and where people can find me, and I can find them.

The metaverse (remember that?) was a whole conceptual obsession over what the future of social media would be like after what we know it as now. Games, VR headsets, AR, AI, virtual gathering places, digital twins. I found the idea comforting at times because VR social apps, at their best, were small-scale and intimate places to connect, something less blown-out and crowded than platforms like Twitter, Facebook and everything else on our phones. The truth is, we're always capable of making new small spaces for ourselves anywhere, with or without tech. All I discovered with my few months back at Bluesky is that keeping things small is good for me, and maybe good for everyone.

I've also been reading a small book at home that's several decades old: On Dialogue, by David Bohm. It's about forming communities and conversation that can transcend assumptions and hatred. How to forge community in the first place. Starting small seems like a key. I'm keeping that in mind every day.

Bluesky's getting bigger. And social media still feels as fragmented as ever. Do I care? Not really. I just want to think of myself as small, even when the world is big. A few good people is better than lots of bad ones. And at this point, as I'm trying to think more about how to connect to a shattered world, and rebuild my sense of community, small sounds great. Find your Bluesky, or wherever else that is, and I hope it works for you too.