Bluesky, a revolutionary decentralized social network protocol, has successfully secured a notable $8 million in seed funding and simultaneously introduced its inaugural paid service. The provision of this funding is valuable in assisting Bluesky’s team expansion, operational management, as well as the development of its groundbreaking AT Protocol. By offering exclusive paid services, Bluesky strives to not only generate revenue but also provide users with an exceptional and long-lasting social network encounter.
In an intriguing turn of events, just moments before the much-anticipated launch of Threads, Bluesky, a Twitter competitor, has made headlines by announcing additional funding and introducing its first paid service. It is backed by Ex Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.
The company, in a recent blog post, revealed that it successfully raised a substantial $8 million in seed funds during the summer. Alongside this, Bluesky transformed from being a public benefit LLC to a public benefit C Corp.
The seed round was led by Neo, a community-led firm boasting notable partners such as Ali Partovi, the co-founder of Code.org, and Suzanne Xie, a former Twitter PM. Several angel investors, including industry figures like Joe Beda, the co-creator of Kubernetes, and Bob Young from Red Hat, participated in the round as well. Notable entities such as Automattic, Protocol Labs, and many others also joined forces to support Bluesky’s vision.
The newfound funds will play a crucial role in Bluesky’s expansion plans, particularly by facilitating the growth of their team, managing operational and infrastructure costs, and advancing the AT Protocol, which powers the Bluesky app.
The primary focus of Bluesky has been to develop a decentralized social network protocol that presents an alternative to ActivityPub. This protocol currently empowers Mastodon, yet another decentralized Twitter rival, and will soon find application in Meta’s Threads app.
Furthermore, Bluesky aims to generate revenue and ensure the sustainability of its network. The company acknowledges the conventional reliance of social media platforms on advertising, often at the expense of users who unwittingly become the product.
Bluesky, however, seeks to forge a different path by offering paid services and experimenting with various strategies that provide genuine value to its users. The blog post emphasizes the need for a fundamentally different business model, given Bluesky’s commitment to user data ownership and freedom. With an open-source codebase and a protocol designed to empower users and enable their seamless departure if desired, Bluesky recognizes that advertising cannot serve as its dominant revenue stream.
