Eppy NWSAug 18, 2023

I had an epiphany about why BlueSky's forever invite system is pissing me off so much.

It's because it's designed-to.

Right now, a bunch of the talented people I follow are semi-gleefully posting their accounts as they get their golden tickets into the cool new place. And talented people, as they get their very few invites, they are inviting their cool talented friends to go hang out, but otherwise the rabble who only followed or commissioned them have to stay on the outside, because there aren't enough invites to go around.

That breeds resentment. It immediately shows folks where they are in the pecking order, and a majority of folks are going to realize they are lower than they felt they were or want to be.

Show threadEppy NWSAug 18, 2023

And what makes Social Networks the most money? Angry people showing up to start drama. There are already folks starting to clap-back at artists posting their bluesky profiles going "STOP ASKING US TO FOLLOW YOU THERE. WE CAN'T YET. THAT'S BY DESIGN. THERE AREN'T ENOUGH INVITES FOR THE NORMIES" and the FIRST thing a lot of the normies are gonna do when they get on bluesky are gonna go digging in people's prior posts looking for 'God. this place is so fun and free without all the fuckin' normies', doing whatever the bluesky equivalent of a QRT is, and reading them for filth right there in public.

And bam: The artist and their followers are now embroiled in drama, staying extra long and providing bluesky with extra ad views, probably paying bluesky for some extra features like the ability to quiet-block whatever normie or make extra-long rebuttal posts and post higher quality GIFs about how the normie's mother is a whore.

Show threadOrca 🌻 | 🎀 | 🪁 | 🏴🏳️‍⚧️
@EppyNWS What is QRT? 🤔
Oct 12, 2023 at 1:13amWeb
Show threadEppy NWSOct 12, 2023

@Orca Quote ReTweet.

Basically the ability to re-post a tweet, but with your added context above it... usually to start drama or otherwise call out the tweet's content/author. The most common and most dramatic often being a simple "This you?" as a response to a tweet, quoting a tweet that makes the original tweet hypocritical.

ActivityPub/Mastodon has deliberately not allowed an "easy" button QRT to stave off some of the more dramatic tendencies of Online Humans (You actually have to copy and paste and/or screenshot whatever take on a toot... usually giving a few extra seconds to consider whether you really need to do a callout/call-in/hot-take/etc or just block/avoid whomever.) BlueSky I think had it at launch.