Jack Dorsey's new Twitter "Bluesky" launched for chosen ones

Jack Dorsey's Twitter alternative, Bluesky, is now available on the App Store, but you need an invite to sign-up and test the new application. It is still in beta, and only selected users are testing it out before the initial release.

Dorsey is known as the co-founder and former CEO of Twitter. Elon Musk acquired the company a couple of months back. A week before that, Dorsey started looking for beta testers to help him improve his decentralized social media app, Bluesky. Bluesky's blog is not the most updated page on the internet, as the last article was published on October 18, 2022. The blog post included insight on "the AT protocol" and a preview of what's to come, but silence has been the game's name until the App Store launch.

Its decentralized structure is what differentiates the app from Twitter. "The AT Protocol is a new federated social network. It integrates ideas from the latest decentralized technologies into a simple, fast, and open network," says the team behind Bluesky in their blog post. It is similar to ActivityPub, which powers Mastodon, another decentralized social media platform. Bluesky offers account portability, algorithmic choice, interoperation, and better performance, as seen in the blog post.

It looks very similar to Twitter, a simplified version, in other words. Tech Crunch says both apps have huge similarities yet small differences, while Twitter asks, "What's happening?" Bluesky's take is, "What's up?" The UI is almost identical as you have your feed and see others' updates, profile pictures, and other information you already have on Twitter. Users can create posts of up to 256 characters. Notifications and "retweets" are also identical, but according to Sarah Perez, the DM option is not available yet.

Dorsey was working on making Twitter a decentralized platform back in 2019, and the Mastodon account had some thoughts on this "unique idea." Especially after Elon Musk's acquisition, many users shifted to Mastodon, and now Bluesky is coming to compete against the decentralized platform and Twitter. While it is not the only work-in-progress app in the specific market, Jack Dorsey's presence and Bluesky's budget get it ahead. Last year, Bluesky announced that it received $13m to ensure it has the freedom and independence to get started on R&D.

Bluesky is still under construction, and only the accepted beta testers are welcome right now. There is still time until it gets available to the public. Currently, the team is working on fixing the bugs and bringing more features so the app gets ready for its official launch. Bringing it to App Store might signal that the public launch is closer than we think.

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