From PC Mag: Bluesky, the decentralized alternative to X, will build out an optional subscription model for its more avid users—one that it pledges will not look or work like X’s premium plans that bestow blue checkmarks on paying users.
The company announced these plans in a post on Thursday, in which it also reported topping 13 million users and completing a $15 million Series A funding round. Signing up for a subscription will unlock features such as “higher quality video uploads or profile customizations like colors and avatar frames” but will not grant extra visibility or reach for one’s content.
“Bluesky will always be free to use—we believe that information and conversation should be easily accessible, not locked down,” it says. “We won’t uprank accounts simply because they’re subscribing to a paid tier.”
That’s a distinct contrast to how things work at X, where paying for a premium tier not only gets the blue checkmark that once meant the service had verified a user's identity but also ranks your replies above those of free users. That wrinkle, combined with the fondness of many subscribers for posting misinformation, has turned replies on X into one of the less useful and more toxic parts of the entire social media universe.
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