write.as

by eepy.bsky.social – June 24th 2023

Welcome to Bluesky! This platform may look and feel a bit like Twitter but it has some key differences especially in the areas of privacy and moderation. This article aims to give you the information you need to make informed decisions about how to use Bluesky safely while avoiding any privacy-related surprises.

As always, check when this was last updated. I try to stay on top of things but shouldn't be trusted to do that 100% of the time.

Summary • Settings: Tune settings so content you want to see is not hidden by default • Privacy: Some stuff you might expect to be private is actually public, especially likes and blocks. Stuff you might expect to be deleted can stick around for a while. • Feeds: Your content is discoverable in ways you might not expect coming from another platform and why your first post is important. • Blocking and Muting: How blocking works in detail and how to use mute-lists.

Settings

I highly highly recommend taking a look at your moderation settings. These will drastically alter your experience of the platform. Adult content for example is turned off by default and your Follow feed will hide replies to posts in some cases.

If you want to see adult content and you're using the iPhone app, you have to log in on the web app and change the settings from there. Android users can simply change the settings from the app.

If you speak multiple languages or want to see content in a language other than one your system (phone or computer) has set as default, manage that under language settings.

Privacy

I wrote a big article that goes into detail about what is and isn't private on Bluesky. You can read it here. To summarize:

API Public i.e: easy for anyone on the internet to access or build tools to access. – posts – reposts – likes – photos – blocks – who you are following – current profile info – your published mute lists

Likes and blocks are the items on this list that are not visible in the official Bluesky app but there are widely used tools to view these and run analyses on them. For example, there's a website where you can see the top most blocked accounts in the last 48 hours. There's also a feed (we'll get to what those are shortly!) where you can view the likes of everyone you follow.

Also want to emphasize that there are third party tools that allow anyone on the internet to view content on Bluesky without an account.

Assumed public i.e: the information is out there but a bit more technical to access or delete. More info here – who you followed and when (even if unfollowed) – who you blocked and when (even if unblocked) – everything you have liked and when, including unliked posts – past profile info such as your handles, display names, and taglines

There was a mass deletion of this information on June 8th but it's unclear how often these will happen. The plan is to not have this information be public eventually. If you know how to use a command line, find instructions on how to delete this stuff manually in the privacy article.

Keep all this in mind as you use the platform! Something to emphasize in this section is that images are deleted immediately and completely but text can sometimes stick around and be accessible to those who know where to look.

So far, when there has been site-wide conflict I haven't seen anyone digging up deleted posts, but it could be done. Someone also at one point made a tool to see who has blocked you. He may have taken it down but I'm not sure – it would also be easy for someone else to make a tool like this.

Always private between you and bluesky – who you have muted – what mute lists you are using (the ones you make are public) – your email address – invite trees: who you invited is visible to you but who invited you is not. Bluesky doesn't publish any invite information. – moderation settings (aside from blocks, which are public) – notification last seen

Showing up in Feeds

If you haven't been on Bluesky very long you might not know about custom feeds. They're pretty cool! Check them out by going to “My Feeds”. There's one for nudes, pictures of cats, posts about science, posts by Black users, posts by furries, posts by users named Alice, posts that contain the word “eepy” and a million other ones.

These feeds are created by third party developers. Feeds can use any API-public information to determine what to show you. For example, there's one feed that shows posts from the most-blocked users of the day and another one that shows you your own likes.

As far as I can tell, there's no way to opt-out of a feed. There was a rumor going around that you could do so by blocking the creator but I tested it and this is false. We'll probably get this feature eventually but I can't say when. For now, just know that your posts can be discovered by people completely outside of your network.

If you haven't made your first post yet, be aware that there is a widely used feed called “Newskies” that shows only first posts. Introduce yourself and give some reasons folks may want to connect with you! If you have made your first post but want a do-over you can delete all the posts you've made (including replies!) then when you make a new post on your empty account it will show up in Newskies.

Muting and Blocking

Who you have blocked is public information. If you block and then unblock someone there can be evidence that you did so that sticks around for an undetermined amount of time. Same with follows and likes. Never like something that could get you fired if your boss is a really motivated jerk! (This is expected to change, but I can't say when)

Unlike blocking, who you mute is private. Users can create mutelists that other users can subscribe to. When you subscribe to a mutelist you will mute any users currently on the list and any added in the future. By unsubscribing, all the users on the list will be un-muted. Which mutelists you subscribe to is private information. There are prominent users who curate mutelists which are widely used in specific communities. “Another one for the contraption” is lingo I've seen used for “add this asshole to your mutelist”.

Since blocks are public, the consequences of doing so are a bit different than they are on Twitter (or anywhere else really). When you block someone, consider that they could at any point look at a list of who has blocked them and see you on it. Also consider that someone could look at a list of who you have blocked.

Blocking someone prevents them from interacting with you in any way with a single exception: blocking you back. This includes: – unblocking you: they can block you back but once they do neither one of you can ever unblock the other – unfollowing you: if you block someone who has followed you they won't be able to unfollow you. They won't see your posts but you'll stay in their list of followers forever. Two people who have followed each other and then blocked each other will never be able to either unblock or unfollow the other.

New users might be interested to know that there is a blocked accounts leaderboard.

Soft-blocking

Soft-blocking is the word for something people do on Twitter where they block and then unblock to remove them as a follower. This does not work on Bluesky! If you block someone who has followed you it will not remove them as a follower and will actually prevent them from being able to unfollow you. They won't see your posts, but they'll be stuck in your follow-list until you unblock them.

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Hope this helps! If you're not a Newskie, send this to your friends along with the invite code.

Follow me at eepy.bsky.social if you'd like.

Questions about this article can be posed under this thread to keep them organized: https://bsky.app/profile/eepy.bsky.social/post/3jyz7p7k4tl2x