Tabletop creators leave X for Bluesky in droves

[Velderan]

Anyone who tries to say that there has not been balkanization of feeds is delusional. People actively seek out echo chambers. I have seen it with friends and family. If I never see another post where someone makes a statement and then says "If you do not agree with me and this statement 100%, then unfriend me," then I will be a happier person.

Personally, I think most people generally want the same things but the main disagreements are due to how to implement them.

I do not feel the need to agree with or accept all the beliefs of my friends in order to be friends with them. I have a big problem with people wanting to force their views on me or put me through purity tests though and is one reason I never went for organized belief systems.

I just go back to not seeing the points of socials like X or Bluesky. It's cool if folks found a new space and enjoy it, but I always look at the news and it just reminds me of the horrors of high school clicks.

If you don't understand the benefit of being able to follow the work of journalists and creators you enjoy and easily keep up on what they're working on, I'm not sure what to tell you.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I just go back to not seeing the points of socials like X or Bluesky. It's cool if folks found a new space and enjoy it, but I always look at the news and it just reminds me of the horrors of high school clicks.

At its best, social media democratizes the spread of information. A number of major news events, both domestically and globally, only had accurate information go out because the traditional media or government gatekeepers -- who sometimes weren't even on the scene when the news was happening -- could be bypassed by ordinary people sharing what was happening.

It happened dramatically again this past weekend, letting ordinary people get the word out about a major news event. Yes, there was still plenty of rumor and intentional disinformation in the feed, but it was pretty clear what happened in Syria if you were on Twitter, even as major news services were openly scrambling to catch up, since few of them were able to operate in-country before the weekend.

 

[Staffan]

That basically describes my experience using Reddit. Each subreddit can potentially have it's own culture based on the material being discussed and how the mod team approaches moderation. I keep hearing people say Reddit is super toxic and I'm sure that is the case for some people; I know I wouldn't go anywhere near the Star Wars subreddit because I can imagine the conversations there without needing to read them. But overall my experience using the site hasn't been bad based on the handful of subreddits I've stuck with.

Large subreddits, and other Internet communities suffer a lot from the fact that in any given fandom, there will be a small percentage of a-holes. And if the fandom is really big, even a small percentage of a-holes make for a large absolute number of a-holes, and unless properly moderated those can be very very loud.

 

[Argyle King]

If you don't understand the benefit of being able to follow the work of journalists and creators you enjoy and easily keep up on what they're working on, I'm not sure what to tell you.

I feel similar to Belen.

Speaking only for myself, journalists that I enjoy most often don't have Twitter as their sole platform. Presumably, creators that I enjoy are creating things with which I interact.

Admittedly, that is because of some internal bias, and that may be something that I need to self-evaluate at some future time. As it currently stands, my own internal valuation of Twitter as a source is only slightly above something like Snapchat.

My experience with Bluesky is nil, so I don't currently have any value associated with it as a platform. But the elevator pitch of "...Twitter but not Twitter..." is not something that appeals to me personally.

As said already, I think it is great that people have choices.

I also agree with what others have said concerning newer forms of media growing as news sources due to legacy media losing credibility.

 

[Velderan]

I feel similar to Belen.

Speaking only for myself, journalists that I enjoy most often don't have Twitter as their sole platform. Presumably, creators that I enjoy are creating things with which I interact.

Admittedly, that is because of some internal bias, and that may be something that I need to self-evaluate at some future time. As it currently stands, my own internal valuation of Twitter as a source is only slightly above something like Snapchat.

My experience with Bluesky is nil, so I don't currently have any value associated with it as a platform. But the elevator pitch of "...Twitter but not Twitter..." is not something that appeals to me personally.

As said already, I think it is great that people have choices.

I also agree with what others have said concerning newer forms of media growing as news sources due to legacy media losing credibility.

Which all sounds great, but the thing is in 1 location I can follow the sports reporter Michael Russo for his coverage of the Minnesota Wild and see what Jason Bulmahn is saying about the new projects he's working on both for Paizo and his own personal projects. You absolutely can't find that anywhere other than sites like Twitter or Bluesky. Are there things I don't like about them? Well, I stopped using Twitter for a reason so yes, but so far Bluesky allows me to get the information I want from the site without jumping through a bunch of hoops to get it.

You don't like them? Cool, I don't like sardines on pizza but I'm not gonna say I don't understand why people do because people are just different from me and that's ok. Acting like you can't understand what the point of a site is when people are explaining it just seems silly to me.

 

[Argyle King]

Which all sounds great, but the thing is in 1 location I can follow the sports reporter Michael Russo for his coverage of the Minnesota Wild and see what Jason Bulmahn is saying about the new projects he's working on both for Paizo and his own personal projects. You absolutely can't find that anywhere other than sites like Twitter or Bluesky. Are there things I don't like about them? Well, I stopped using Twitter for a reason so yes, but so far Bluesky allows me to get the information I want from the site without jumping through a bunch of hoops to get it.

You don't like them? Cool, I don't like sardines on pizza but I'm not gonna say I don't understand why people do because people are just different from me and that's ok. Acting like you can't understand what the point of a site is when people are explaining it just seems silly to me.

For me, most of that post might as well be a foreign language.

To clarify, I'm not saying that out of any type of snarkiness. It's simply that you have different interests than I do.

I prefer sardines out of a can, with spicy mustard sauce -on a cracker.

 

[Belen]

If you don't understand the benefit of being able to follow the work of journalists and creators you enjoy and easily keep up on what they're working on, I'm not sure what to tell you.

I can see the benefit. It does not mean that you have not created your own personal echo chamber though.

I follow creators and folks on YouTube. YouTube then tries to create an echo chamber for me. It is very clear that the algorithm starts trying to show me more content like what I have already seen. I find it annoying.

These platforms, TiKTok, YouTube, Twitter, BlueSky etc are all going to do the same thing to some extent in order to maximize your time on the platform.

Other than YouTube, I just do not get into the follow culture and if I see news, then I will usually search out different platforms to see how the story is framed from multiple perspectives. I like to see the various biases whenever possible.

It's not that I do not understand the benefits that folks find from these experiences. I do.

People do create echo chambers for themselves and I still think that a lot of people delude themselves into thinking that are not part of one.

 

[trappedslider]

I follow creators and folks on YouTube. YouTube then tries to create an echo chamber for me. It is very clear that the algorithm starts trying to show me more content like what I have already seen. I find it annoying.

Do you also dislike it when Amazon does the same for books?

 

[Mannahnin]

These platforms, TiKTok, YouTube, Twitter, BlueSky etc are all going to do the same thing to some extent in order to maximize your time on the platform.

I agree that they want to maximize your time on and engagement with the platform, but the data I've seen isn't that they do this by giving you an echo chamber, unless you ONLY engage and interact with content you agree with.

As cable news learned in the 90s, people often engage passionately with content they disagree with- stuff that makes them angry or upset. Clickbait media followed, and succeeds and is profitable. So if you click on and especially if you comment on a story that ticks you off, or is about something which does, any of the social media platforms will give you more of that content.

 

[Belen]

Do you also dislike it when Amazon does the same for books?

Yes. They do not allow me to deselect self-published books and it drives me nuts. Their algorithms for recommendations used to be great but are awful now. They made them worse on purpose.