- Bluesky and Nostr are two platforms similar to Twitter with the difference that they are decentralized and both have the support of Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.
- These two platforms have had significant growth and are experiencing rapid growth, partly motivated by the constant changes that Elon Musk applies to Twitter.
There is a saying that, in troubled rivers, fishermen gain, which is very accurate if we transfer it to the current circumstances in which the social network Twitter finds itself, especially after the tycoon and SEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk, will take the baton of the platform and make (and continue to make) a series of changes that are otherwise controversial.
Of the most controversial so far are the verification marks that it has eliminated and reassigned, in a fluctuation of decisions with the aim of making its Twitter Blue service more commercial.
Also, due to the constant changes in the microblogging service, other companies have begun to “eat the errand” to the little blue bird.
Bluesky and Nostra
Bluesky and Nostraare two platforms not related to each other, and similar to Twitter. Despite having no ties between them share some particular characteristics, such as the fact that both are decentralized and both have the backing of the software developer, entrepreneur, founder and CEO of Square, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.
These are not the only similar characteristics that these two platforms have, but, in addition, They are having an accelerated growth, partly motivated by the constant changes that Elon Musk applies to Twitter.
What is Bluesky?
Bluesky recently launched its app for Android smartphones on April 21, nearly two months after its iOS client launched on Apple’s App Store.
Although an invitation is required to access Bluesky’s service, this has not stopped its user base from experiencing exciting growth, with an average of 1,000 to 2,500 new members per day.
Similarly, it is important to note that Bluesky is actually a proof-of-concept interface to the underlying AT protocol, which aims to lay the foundation for a vast network of interoperable applications and services.s.
What is Nostra?
For his part, Nostr is a service very similar to the AT Protocol and already has more than a dozen applications and other services operating under its name.
The acronym Nostr stands for “notes and other stuff transmitted by relays”. Unlike Bluesky, joining Nostr is much more complicated due to the fact that this decentralized protocol is based on public and private key cryptography, which involves the use of a lot of technical terminology and jargon that is not widely known.
A user’s canonical identity in Nostr is their public key, which looks something like: npub1hpgg9mnu3ckf9kaju8y5mn79e7ymqwsk0m3fwfk78wzevn2av6ksgewwvf.
Although it is possible for a user to sign up with a shorter username, this could cost the user some cryptocurrency.
Different services, different users
Due to differences in the registration process, these services have attracted different audiences. Nostr has been mainly adopted by technical communities, while Bluesky has attracted a more diverse mix of users, including digital artists, NFT fans, political and social activists, and people who post everyday content like photos of food, cats, and more that is more reminiscent of Twitter.
Although registration on Nostr can be tricky, according to some reports, this hasn’t stopped the service from being bigger than Bluesky and the AT Protocol.
One of the possible reasons why Nostr has been successful in terms of the size of its community is because it has a variety of applications instead of a single platform.. Some of these apps are Damus on iOS, Amethyst on Android, and the snort.social web interface.
Bluesky, on the other hand, also has interesting features despite having a smaller user base. Its decentralized approach allows usernames to be linked to web domain names, which can be used as a form of verification.
Bluesky CEO Jay Graber uses the username @jay.bsky.team. Anyone who is linked to bsky.team can officially consider themselves a member of the Bluesky team.
With great power comes great responsibility
Despite the good growth that these platforms have shown, they are not exempt from problems similar to those experienced by large companies, such as the technical problems that have affected Twitter in the past.
In the case of Bluesky, slow performance issues and some broken features have been reported.
As for Nostr, the platform is facing a debate about the implementation of “Zaps”, which are different interactions than likes, replies or forwards. “Zaps” also support blockchain integration for things like micropayments.
Debate and controversy arise because, by adding value to interactions, users expect a “Zap” to have more meaning both given and received.
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