About getting the momentum started on a new social networking platform.

I think the Blue Sky platform will have better luck competing with Facebook than attempts to compete with Facebook in the past. Granted, it's not quite the same, it's more like Twitter (now X).

In the past some attempts to compete with Facebook couldn't get the momentum going due to platforms playing lip service to privacy.

Privacy is kind of the antithesis of social networking. If folks are on a new network, privacy will mean little content can be seen until one builds up a network of friends. Getting this momentum started can be difficult.

Facebook got going early so the friend networks are established. Other platforms have trouble breaking that momentum unless they are more like the open web where content can be searched in Google and so forth.

Where content can be found without having to be friended in friend networks. In a more open environment, friend networks can still develop over time.

I think the wish for privacy may have made Ello, an alternative social network launched in 2014 never really got off the ground. It closed in 2023.

Content on Blue Sky seems to be more available to newcomers who haven't yet established friend networks there. Reddit is similar in being more open as are platforms like Flickr.