Decentralized social network and Twitter rival Blue sky is finally allowing users to view posts on its platform without logging in. Users still need an invitation to create an account and start posting, but they can read posts via a link.
This move will also allow publishers to link to or embed Bluesky posts on blogs. Additionally, users can share them in individual or group chats.
Bluesky users can toggle a setting Settings > Monitoring > Logout Visibility to stop the social network from displaying its posts for logged out users. However, this limit only applies to Bluesky’s website and its own app. The company said other third-party clients might not respect the switch and show your posts anyway. Therefore, if you wish not to share posts with a wider audience, you should make your profile private.
In a blog post, company CEO Jay Graber also revealed a new butterfly emoji logo that replaces the generic well logo… a blue sky with clouds.
“Early on, we noticed people organically using the butterfly emoji 🦋 to indicate their Bluesky handles,” said Graber “We loved it and adopted it as it spread. The butterfly speaks to our mission to transform social media into something new.”
This year, Bluesky launched iOS and Android apps and reached 2 million users. The social network also rolled out different moderation tools after being criticized for the type of content it allowed on the platform. While Bluesky is currently the only instance in the AT Protocol, it is aiming for federation “early next year”. This means we may see more Bluesky compliant servers and instances with their own set of rules.
Bluesky’s announcement comes at a time when Meta’s Threads has begun experimenting with ActivityPub integration. Following Meta’s announcement earlier this month, Instagram head Adam Mosseri and but peoples from Threads club have started making their accounts and posts visible on Mastodon and other compatible apps.