The fast-rising Xitter alternative Bluesky is designed to be "billionaire-proof," says CEO Jay Graber.
Speaking to CNBC's Money Movers, Graber explained that unlike Musk's walled garden, Bluesky's open-source architecture means users can pack up their digital bags — followers and all — and move if the network becomes a cesspool of sociopathic manbabies.
"The billionaire proof is in the way everything is designed, and so if someone bought or if the Bluesky company went down, everything is open source," Graber said. "This means that someone else can pick if up and run with it…. What happened to Twitter couldn't happen to us in the same ways, because you would always have the option to immediately move without having to start over."
Since the recent presidential election, Bluesky has experienced a massive surge, welcoming over 7 million new users in just two weeks. It now has 21 million users total – still a pittance compared to X's claimed 600 million (though market intelligence firm Sensor Tower suggests it's closer to 318 million) and Threads' 275 million monthly users. But many journalists and celebrities have quit Xitter and migrated to Bluesky, making Xitter less attractive for people seeking breaking news.
Now independent and $36 million in funding richer, Bluesky is focusing on a user-first approach. They're promising to skip the algorithmic ad-shoving that other social platform depend on, focusing instead on subscriptions and developer ecosystems rather than the traditional advertising model.
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