Bluesky and social media

2023.08.27

Lately it feels like time is passing faster.
When I sit down to write, I tend to forget what I wanted to say.
This is just a stream of consciousness, so don't expect it to be too coherent.
I signed up for bluesky today. The new social network. Finally managed to get an invitation code. And as soon as I got in and had explored a bit, I remembered why I don't like (modern) social media. It's too centralized. It's like we're all trapped inside this big silo. The old web was decentralized, obviously. Apart from that though, it felt more like the real world. The websites were personalized, and by clicking links out from sites you liked, the likelihood of you landing on similar sites was high. So you could follow this trail of sites that were all different, yet within the same 'niche'.

It's also too distracting. As someone who hasn't used social media (apart from youtube on the computer, if that counts) for years, I can literally FEEL how modern social media platforms don't want you to stay on one profile/page for too long, but instead wants you to keep "exploring". Because that exploration gives you dopamine hits which encourages you to stay on the APP for longer.
Staying on a single profile/page doesn't do that. Once you've seen enough images/content from that creator, you'll be satiated and move on to something else. Not necessarily within the app.
Remember when you'd check websites to see if they had been updated? If they hadn't, you'd either click off and go do something else completely, or move onto the next website in your roster. A roster that was exhaustable. Now you can keep going forever, and that's what they want you to do.

I forgot what else I wanted to say, but I hope that personal websites will make a return.