X rival Bluesky gains 1.25 million users following U.S. election

X rival Bluesky gains 1.25 million users following U.S. election


In this photo illustration, the Bluesky Social logo is displayed on a cell phone in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on September 4, 2024. 

Mauro Pimentel | AFP | Getty Images

Micro-blogging startup Bluesky has gained over 1.25 million new users in the past week, indicating some social media users are changing their habits following the U.S. presidential election. 

Bluesky’s influx of users underscore how the app has been able to pitch itself as an alternative to rivals X, which is owned by Elon Musk, and Meta’s Threads. The bulk of the new users are coming from the U.S., Canada and the United Kingdom, the company said Wednesday. 

“We’re excited to welcome everyone looking for a better social media experience,” Bluesky CEO Jay Graber told CNBC in a statement.

Despite the surge of users, Bluesky’s total base remains a fraction of its rivals’. The Seattle startup claims 15.2 million total users. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in October said Threads had nearly 275 million monthly users. Musk in May claimed that X had 600 million monthly users, but market intelligence firm Sensor Tower pegged X’s monthly base at 318 million users in October.

“Journalists, politicians, and news junkies have also been talking up Bluesky as a better X alternative than Threads,” wrote Similarweb, the internet traffic and monitoring service, in a Tuesday blog.

Some users with new Bluesky accounts posted that they had moved to the service due to Musk and his support for President-elect Donald Trump. 

“It’s appalling that Elon Musk has transformed Twitter into a Trump propaganda machine, rife with disinformation and misinformation,” one user posted on Bluesky. 

This is Bluesky’s second notable surge in the last couple of months. 

Bluesky said it picked up 2 million new users in September after the Brazilian Supreme Court suspended X in the country for failing to comply with regional content moderation policies and not appointing a local representative.

Watch: Cramer’s Mad Dash: Alphabet and Meta.

Cramer’s Mad Dash: Alphabet & Meta



Source

The Pentagon’s battle inside the U.S. for control of a new Cyber Force
Technology

The Pentagon’s battle inside the U.S. for control of a new Cyber Force

A recent Chinese cyber-espionage attack inside the nation’s major telecom networks that may have reached as high as the communications of President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect J.D. Vance was designated this week by one U.S. senator as “far and away the most serious telecom hack in our history.” The U.S. has yet to figure […]

Read More
How Elon Musk’s plan to slash government agencies and regulation may benefit his empire
Technology

How Elon Musk’s plan to slash government agencies and regulation may benefit his empire

Elon Musk’s business empire is sprawling. It includes electric vehicle maker Tesla, social media company X, artificial intelligence startup xAI, computer interface company Neuralink, tunneling venture Boring Company and aerospace firm SpaceX.  Some of his ventures already benefit tremendously from federal contracts. SpaceX has received more than $19 billion from contracts with the federal government, […]

Read More
Why X’s new terms of service are driving some users to leave Elon Musk’s platform
Technology

Why X’s new terms of service are driving some users to leave Elon Musk’s platform

Elon Musk attends the America First Policy Institute gala at Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, Nov. 14, 2024. Carlos Barria | Reuters X’s new terms of service, which took effect Nov. 15, are driving some users off Elon Musk’s microblogging platform.  The new terms include expansive permissions requiring users to allow the company to use […]

Read More