Summary
This episode centers on Bluesky’s new CEO Toni Schneider and the company’s effort to balance being a consumer social app with being an open protocol ecosystem. A major theme is that Bluesky sees the app as an entry point into a larger interoperable network, where identity and social data can move across services. The conversation also digs into long-term protocol decisions, especially around moderation, private communities, and who should control key pieces of the stack. Schneider emphasizes decentralization, including moving parts of the infrastructure to outside organizations like a Swiss nonprofit and the IETF. The episode also covers monetization, the role of AI in speeding development, and how Bluesky’s protocol differs from ActivityPub.
Key Takeaways
- 1Bluesky is building both a consumer app and a broader open protocol ecosystem, with the app intended to bring people into the network rather than define the whole product.
- 2Many of Bluesky’s most important decisions are being made with a decades-long horizon in mind, especially at the protocol level.
- 3Bluesky’s moderation model is composable and distributed, allowing multiple parties to apply labels and different communities to adopt the moderation systems they prefer.
- 4Private data and private communities are seen as the next major evolution of the protocol and could unlock far more use cases.
- 5Bluesky is intentionally decentralizing control by handing important parts of the system to outside institutions.
- 6AI is accelerating software development, but it does not eliminate the need for product judgment, design, or management.
Notable Quotes
""Blue Sky today is really two things. There's the Blue Sky app, which is what a lot of people are familiar with. It's a social network... But more importantly, underneath Blue Skies, a open protocol called Approdo.""
""I feel like a lot of decisions we make are actually reversible. And I like to optimize to just make those decisions quickly.""
""The next evolution of the protocol is private data.""
""We want the pie to get huge for us to be small slice of a big pie and for everybody to make money.""
""AI helps but you're still dealing with that same complexity for a while but I see it accelerate everything just in terms of the development pace.""
""The heart of app protocol is personal identity and portability and ownership of that.""
""If we get this right at the protocol level that just goes away ... you just have one account you log in anywhere and it just works.""
""We have very good tools for people to mute and block ... we're interested in social media that actually serves the common or the public good.""
Episode questions
Why does Bluesky emphasize the protocol as much as the app?
Because the app is meant to demonstrate what the protocol can do and bring people into the network. Schneider says the real long-term value is a large, interoperable ecosystem where many apps and communities can coexist.
How does Bluesky think about moderation at scale?
Bluesky uses a composable moderation system where multiple parties can add labels and communities can decide whether to use them. This distributes moderation work and lets different communities enforce different norms.
What is the next major product direction for Bluesky?
Private data and private communities are the next big step. Schneider says the protocol currently supports only public products, and enabling private spaces could unlock far more use cases.
How will Bluesky make money?
Schneider says Bluesky wants a model where it makes money when the broader network makes money. He points to affiliate-style monetization and revenue sharing from traffic that Bluesky sends to other businesses.