Bluesky made more money selling T-shirts mocking Mark Zuckerberg in one day than it has in two years of selling custom domains
-
As much as I hate to be that guy, it's worth keeping in mind that BlueSky is not really practising what they preach here. The AT protocol formally allows for a kind of decentralization, but it is prohibitively expensive to run an instance, meaning that only rich folks or those who are willing to accept money from venture capitalists will be capable of actually doing so.
ActivityPub already existed when they started BlueSky. They chose to not make their protocol compatible. The reason is simple: They are a company, and they have a profit motive. ActivityPub is too democratic, and therefore hard to monetize. By now they have a bunch of crypto bro investors who want their money back. It's better to leave your money elsewhere.
I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. The IT world is full of people developing their own thing because they think they can do better, and sometimes they succeed and make something nice. Who knows, maybe they'll turn out alright?
Then they took crypto bro venture capital and my charitable optimism went out the window.
-
Ofcourse they ain’t making shit from custom domains. Anyone who is interested in connecting a domain to their Bsky account and has the skills or patience to learn how to probably already has a domain bought at another registrar to connect to.
Also they only make referral fees because they're not a registrar themselves
-
It's funny because if you read history you know that Caesar took down the republic on a wave of populism.
Zuckerberg doesn't seem like he has the charisma for that.
I can't really remember hearing him speak at all tbh
-
Zuck puts out this weird “pick me” or “me too” energy lately, trying to fashion himself as one compatible with Trump’s world. His interest in Rome may precede Trump’s ascension to power, but his coming out is not a coincidence in my view. And yes, a fascination with Rome started as so many other things as an “innocent” meme and became a fascist dog-whistle.
I think fascists idolizing the Roman Empire goes back as far as Mussolini. The fasces, after which fascism is named, was a Roman symbol.
-
I was on Reddit for 12 years with nearly a million Karma, and I got permabanned soon after the Inauguration for repeating an anti-MAGA opinion I had posted numerous times before he was elected.
I came over to Lemmy, and discovered that I was only one victim of a bloodbath, demonstrating that Reddit had decided to forego their free speech mission, and grovel for their new masters. Pathetic punk ass corporation.
I never wore a Reddit shirt, but I'd happily wear a Lemmy shirt.
-
I thought this was slightly funny.
Mark Zuckerberg is known these days for wearing t-shirts with Latin phrases on them, especially ones where he compares himself to Julius Caesar.
Bluesky made a shirt in the same style, but theirs says "a world without Caesars" in Latin.
This is my kind of monetization.
Feels way better than getting features pulled and put behind an increasingly higher paywall.
-
well, because everyone has the right to sell one, basically
-
I was on Reddit for 12 years with nearly a million Karma, and I got permabanned soon after the Inauguration for repeating an anti-MAGA opinion I had posted numerous times before he was elected.
I came over to Lemmy, and discovered that I was only one victim of a bloodbath, demonstrating that Reddit had decided to forego their free speech mission, and grovel for their new masters. Pathetic punk ass corporation.
I never wore a Reddit shirt, but I'd happily wear a Lemmy shirt.
Poor blue maga, while anyone with a consciense was permabanned from Reddit loooong ago by Jessica Ashoosh, now their slightly more right wing sister party has done it to them.
You had so much free speech as long as it was the US regime narrative.
Says more about you people than Reddit. -
Zuckerberg wears t-shirts comparing himself to Julius Caesar? Why is that every time I think I’m up-to-date on the latest weirdness there’s more of it?
Roman empire, like the nordic pagan BS is also a (extreme) right-wing fetish.
So glad to see our new PM celebrating his election win like this:
-
This is my kind of monetization.
Feels way better than getting features pulled and put behind an increasingly higher paywall.
Give it time.
-
I bet that if you tell Markie that Caesar was a probably bisexual man affected by mini-strokes and/or epilepsy, he would make those t-shirts disappear in a minute.
Ignorance is bliss.
Augustus, not Julius.
-
The real problem begins when one has to consider how to make money from a social media platform. Selling T-shirts with sick burns written in Latin is not going to work forever.
Right... isn't the obvious response to this "holy shit, they really don't have a business model even remotely figured out here???" and then the realization that everything they promise (no matter how genuine the employee saying them is personally) is subject to being sacrificed at the alter of "sorry we had to monetize and make difficult decisions".
This isn't difficult, it is just exhausting.
-
I imagine selling t-shirts would be against the Marxist/Leninist ideology of Lenny’s devs?
But given the volume of non-tankie instances now up and running, I’m sure some enterprising admins would be willing to give it a go.
..and as long as they’re ethically sourced (no sweatshops), high quality (materials and GSM), and reasonably priced (accounting for the other two factors) - I’m all for it!
-
Yeah I would say they likely just aren't using the protocol properly, that being said I'm not sure I know of an example who is.
Why are we acting like this is a detail.
Why did I have to burrow all the way down to this spot to see this?
The conversation should begin, or very nearly begin with this as it puts EVERYTHING ELSE around bluesky hype into question, it transmutes the castles you are describing into constructions of sand that might topple any moment to forces of money, greed and effective (even if not explicit) centralized control.
sigh I don't mean to attack you personally, but this conversation feels so warped sometimes.
-
There are minimum standards they'll have to abide by, but that's similar to Meta after their change of policy. It really is not enough that it should make anyone feel comfortable.
Basically big platforms can choose between making moderation expensive, minimal, or arbitrary. Bluesky is leaning into minimal, keeping the door open for most things as long as they're legal. Reddit is leaning into arbitrary, having AI banning folks on account of upvotes. Facebook used to dabble with expensive, but have made a recent shift into minimal.
Bluesky is leaning into minimal, keeping the door open for most things as long as they're legal.
This simply will not work, some other option, probably rushed, poorly thought through and ultimately more authoritarian than an honestly constructed moderation structure would have been will be implemented when this approach ultimately fails catastrophically.
I pre-emptively post a surprised pikachu here to signify this
-
I thought this was slightly funny.
Mark Zuckerberg is known these days for wearing t-shirts with Latin phrases on them, especially ones where he compares himself to Julius Caesar.
Bluesky made a shirt in the same style, but theirs says "a world without Caesars" in Latin.
of course the android wears a shirt with latin phrases.
-
Roman empire, like the nordic pagan BS is also a (extreme) right-wing fetish.
So glad to see our new PM celebrating his election win like this:Sorry but which country is this? Can you elaborate on that photo?
-
Well, most people don't read Latin, so there's a high risk of ending up looking exactly as pretentious as the asshole one seeks to make fun of.
he probably wore it when visiting latin america.
-
Stop trying to make fetch happen
-
I thought this was slightly funny.
Mark Zuckerberg is known these days for wearing t-shirts with Latin phrases on them, especially ones where he compares himself to Julius Caesar.
Bluesky made a shirt in the same style, but theirs says "a world without Caesars" in Latin.
What about "Tu quoque, Brute"?
