It’s been a strong year for Bluesky who is ending 2024 on a high note.
The company’s CEO shared her thoughts on how the platform is adored by many from the vibrant community of users who love customized selections. It’s also the next best option that lets users make decisions that aren’t enforced by a single billionaire CEO.
In case you’re wondering, we’re referring to once very popular X that seems to be running users away thanks to Musk’s decisions. But a lot of questions still arise about Bluesky's future and how it wants to make money. Will it eventually resort to the most common tactic that online businesses use to generate revenue which is ads?
The company has so far raised close to $15M this year and CEO Jay Graber explains how she is getting more attention from a list of investors. Bluesky also hinted that several revenue streams do exist such as subscriptions, algorithm marketplaces, and domain name sales. Graber does not necessarily want to add ads but she didn’t rule it out either completely.
When asked if Bluesky would be ad-free like what we’re seeing today, she called the claim not necessarily true. For her, there’s no harm in exploring advertising. The goal is to make it more user driven so it’s a win-win situation on both ends.
Bluesky’s incentives are with users and they want to ensure it’s not transformed into a model where the final attention is on a single product. Graber feels copying others and repeating their errors will never get you far. The company’s current model stops business models from relying solely on the likes of advertising.
Users can create different feeds without using ads on the open protocol end of the spectrum.
It’s interesting when she shared her insights as a digital rights activist who likes to be in control of the app she’s using for communication. Still, ads might be coming soon but the only difference here has to do with not compromising the main user experience.
So we can soon expect ads inside the app’s search feature that are less intrusive means to feature ads. Still, nothing is final, just ideas on the table as per the CEO. What she did confirm is saying no to licensing deals which the app will not profit from.
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