Bluesky is a social app that is designed to not be controlled by a single company. We're creating a version of social media where it's built by many people, and it still comes together as a cohesive, easy-to-use experience. We've done this by building Bluesky on the AT Protocol, an open source toolbox for building social apps that can all talk to each other.
Traditional social networks are often closed platforms with a central authority. There’s a small group of people who control those companies, and they have total control over how users can use the platform and what developers can build.
As a developer, if you try to build a new app, you have to overcome network effects to rebuild the social graph from scratch, and if you try to build on the APIs of these companies they can cut you off and kill your company in the blink of an eye. As a creator, you might spend years building an audience only to lose access to it when the platform changes the rules on you.
