Bluesky recently confirmed that Jack Dorsey is no longer part of the company’s board. Now, Dorsey has revealed more details about it, including his vision of the company’s current situation with respect to its original idea. The Twitter co-founder feels that Bluesky is repeating the same mistakes that Twitter made.
Dorsey’s original idea for Bluesky is far from the company’s current reality
In a recent interview with Mike Solana, Dorsey made it clear how different his original idea was from Bluesky’s current state. He wanted to return to an idea he had during the beginnings of Twitter: an open-source social platform without tight corporate control. With Twitter, this became impossible if it wanted to continue growing as a company. So, in 2019, he played a key role in the birth of the Bluesky project.
Dorsey wanted Bluesky to be an open-source protocol without seeking profits, and Twitter would be the first to take advantage of it. He did not want the project to become an independent company, since this usually involves control by shareholders and other things derived from the corporate world. He was also against the moderation systems that were implemented as the service became more popular.
Implementing moderation tools was a Bluesky mistake, Twitter co-founder claims
Dorsey appears to share with Musk the idea of maintaining freedom of speech on social platforms. With Bluesky, he wanted to take it to a point where it was no longer possible on Twitter. So, those who no longer felt happy on Twitter could turn to alternatives based on the protocol. However, regarding this, he said that “little by little, it started asking Jay (Graber, CEO of Bluesky) and the team for moderation tools, and to kick people off. And unfortunately they followed through with it. That was the second moment I thought, uh, nope. This is literally repeating all the mistakes we made as a company.”
In the past, Dorsey has repeated that Twitter’s problem was being beholden to corporate and advertiser interests. He called this the “original sin” of Twitter multiple times. Bluesky was born to offer an alternative to that situation. But over time, they are following the same path he wanted to “escape” from. Implementing moderation tools was another Bluesky mistake, according to Twitter co-founder.
Even when he was a part of Twitter, Dorsey was not happy with all the moderation measures they demanded of him. That is one of the reasons why he supported Elon Musk in purchasing Twitter.
A Bluesky engineer responded harshly to Dorsey’s words
The Twitter co-founder’s comments about Bluesky’s mistakes reached the ears of the current dev team. As expected, they were not taken in the best way, especially by Paul Frazee, Bluesky’s protocol engineer. According to him, it was Musk who killed the idea of Twitter being the first platform to take advantage of the Bluesky protocol.
Frazee also has a harsh opinion on the idea of an unmoderated social platform. More specifically, he considers it a “ridiculous idea.” He uses the argument that surely Bluesky-based apps would not be accepted by app stores and regulators. However, this is in line with Dorsey’s original idea that Bluesky should not be a profit-seeking company.
Dorsey is financing projects similar to his original idea
Currently, Jack Dorsey is funding Nostr, a decentralized social platform that seems to be in line with his original idea. Although he admits that it is not the most intuitive or beautiful social platform available, he says that “if you truly believe in censorship resistance and free speech, you have to use the technologies that actually enable that, and defend your rights.”