Mastodawn

Elena Rossini ⁂

Can you imagine Mastodon raising 100 MILLION dollars from a crypto VC fund and failing to disclose it... for a full year? No I can't either.

And from their actual press release: "The Atmosphere currently contains about 20 billion public records—the posts, likes, comments and other interactions that bring the ecosystem to life. It's an astonishing collection of what open social infrastructure makes possible."

https://bsky.social/about/blog/03-19-2026-series-b

How I read it: data harvesting at its finest 💁‍♀️

Bluesky's 2025 $100M Series B Lays Foundation for Open Social Web - Bluesky

In April 2025, Bluesky raised $100 million in Series B funding led by Bain Capital Crypto. Since our Series A, we've grown from 13 million to over 43 million global users.

Bluesky

Elena Rossini ⁂Mar 20

Mike Masnick, who sits on the board of #Bluesky, claims the team was too busy to announce the series B funding (see screenshot).

But something is fishy.

Even the VC firm - Bain Capital Crypto - isn't listing Bluesky anywhere on their website: https://baincapitalcrypto.com/portfolio/

Why the mystery? Was Bluesky afraid of a public backlash & asked to keep the information under wraps?

Sorry if I keep repeating myself but I will forever be skeptical of Bluesky and think of the tale of the scorpion and the frog.

@_elena Very sketchy behaviour, for certain.

Michael Santaly Mar 20

@_elena Yea. I’m hopefully that projects like Blacksky can completely break free of Bluesky, but being ignorant of how the tech works I worry there’s some kind of rug pull to come

ikuturso 🇪🇺Mar 20

@wonkothesane well when the userbase is mostly on Bluesky and likely to stay there I don't really see the ability to completely break free as very realistic. It's also true their retained control absolutely allows them to rug pull no matter how many times they say "credible exit".

derptron Mar 20

@ikuturso @wonkothesane @_elena The idea of a personal data server is a good one but it needs some stuff. You should be able to put permissions on things and manage who has access. In AT it's all public.

Should also be able to manage what relays pull what. Be able to negotiate with relays to get into feeds (you're a journalist and want to publish to a journal so you ask to be on their relays).

There's stuff to like about AT. Someone was working on a good idea before VC's got it.

Kent Navalesi ☕️Mar 20

@ikuturso
@wonkothesane @_elena

My guess is that, now that some alternative PDS's are coming online, they're going to rush to stipulate some enshittifying terms for them to connect to the main Bsky server. Allow ads (or data harvesting, or whatever) or lose access to 99% of users.

@_elena Bain Capital Crypto is involved in the European project supposed to create an alternative to GitHub. Super red flag, I think.
https://goodtech.info/tangled-levee-fonds-alternative-open-source-github/

🚀 Tangled : l'alternative open source à GitHub lève 3,8 millions d'euros

Décentralisation, souveraineté numérique et protocole AT : on vous explique comment Tangled veut bousculer le monopole de Microsoft sur le code.

Goodtech

ikuturso 🇪🇺Mar 20

@patpro that's another project that is building on Bluesky (ATproto) so even without the funding not being so european now it already has dependencies to the US platform and I guess BCC funding both it and Bluesky is not suprising when they are part of the same ecosystem...
@_elena

@_elena And this is how I find out that he's on their board. 😅

Even if Bsky themselves and some of their staff actions didn't raise alarms from the get go for me. The fact that they are located in the US under current administration and the lack of autonomy does.

I'm happy I finally took the plunge and made them my back up social media and Mastodon my primary. I like some of the utility over there, but it's already doing the spiral I watched Twitter doing before leaving there.

@707Kat @[email protected] They're really speedrunning the cycle!

@erikcats "By the magic of AI ✨"

@707Kat 😂😂😂 I hate it but I'm laughing

@erikcats Haha that was my intend. 😂

You'll probably laugh watching this as well.

TLDW; Video goes over how OpenAI has had to hire a projectlead who is now raising alarm about all of their unfinished projects going nowhere other than wasting money and resources.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2guHaoY2_Y

AI is decreasing productivity

YouTube

@707Kat they sell vibe more than anything, so all projects trumps product (see Ee-lahn Mushk for reference).

But you're wrong, the video had me facepalming 😂 good video!

@erikcats I believe facpalming should be a standard response to what's been happening with this tech for the past couple of years.

ikuturso 🇪🇺Mar 20

@_elena it's insane to think people would believe this "explanation"...

Mr.Mark "The Sharpie King"Mar 20

@_elena
Thanks for highlighting this.
Bsky smells of narrative capture to me, much like Substack, (who are now teaming up with prediction markets)

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵Mar 20

@markmetz @_elena what's narrative capture?

Mr.Mark "The Sharpie King"Mar 20

@bazkie @_elena
This article explains it better than I can.

https://america2.news/without-sky-social-media-and-the-end-of-reality/

Without Sky: Social Media and the End of Reality

People are flocking to Bluesky in droves, but creators and users should think critically about the risk of capture by potentially hostile investors.

America 2.0

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵Mar 20

@markmetz thanks i'll give it a read later :)

Ted Mielczarek Mar 20

@_elena all the startups I've worked for have blasted out press releases the moment their funding rounds closed. Part of being a startup means constantly vying for attention. This explanation does not hold up.

william.maggos Mar 20

@tedmielczarek @_elena

Is there any requirement to make it public within 1 year? otherwise I wonder why they're announcing it at all.

@[email protected] @[email protected] I have had the same experience. I co-founded a startup in 2016 that managed to secure a funding round, and the VCs themselves were giddy about announcing it as widely as possible. I've consulted for startups both before and after that, and as far as I'm aware every one of them that secured funding rapidly announced it. This explanation from Bluesky does not pass a basic smell test.

d@nny disc@ mc² Mar 20

@tedmielczarek @_elena series B is one of the stages that represents a categorical step up in financing and control structures. series G like sure at that point people tend to stop counting but B is still a champagne event

samiamsam Mar 20

sure that amount of VC cash slipped their minds

sure

Aubrey De Los Destinos Mar 20

@_elena @benroyce Mike was a surprise with his siding with Bluesky.

@_elena Yeah, I don't believe this for one minute.

Considering what a big deal it is for most companies to successfully raise VC money, they want us to believe that it wasn't important enough to make time to announce it? Any other company would drop everything to shout it from the rooftops.

And a funding round is a significant amount of work already, so are we supposed to believe that after all that work they had to put into it, they didn't schedule time to even do the tiniest announcement about it?

And like, I would have guessed that the VC firm itself also has PR people whose job it would be to help out with that, and they were still too busy? No.

Amoshias Mar 20

@_elena oh, Mike. oh, oh, oh, Mike.

I like the guy and appreciate what he does but just...

this isn't a thing.

does he think all the other companies are just sitting around eating bonbons, and this one specific company is busy?

@Amoshias @_elena I’ve been really disappointed with Mike Masnick since he jumped on the corporate social network train.

Cairo Braga Mar 20

@_elena (can you link the post, please? I'd love to see how people are reacting to this "dog ate my homework"-ass excuse, lol)

Craig Michael Patrick Mar 20

@_elena @Jerry Curious if there’s a plan to monetize #Bluesky you are aware of? Two points to accent your post:

- criticism on #Mastodon initially feels like smearing a rival platform first, investigative reporting second. (Feel free to push back on that, it’s just the vibe I get when I read these articles)

- bureaucracy is an issue with brand communication. This MAY be what Bluesky is encountering because the United States needs to have a serious conversation about the illusion of brand

Jerry on Mastodon Mar 20

@craig_patrick @_elena
They aren't forthcoming about financing. So, as would be expected, they are not forthcoming about their monetization plans. These are 2 bad signs.

Then add in the gaslighting about why major funding went unmentioned by both Bluesky and the VCs: "Everyone at Bluesky is just so gosh dang busy nobody had time to mention it." This is the gaslighting we see daily in the news. "I'll give you an obvious, nonsensical excuse, but still expect you to believe it because you all are gullible and emotion-driven."

Venture Capital is based on one essential paradigm: an investment now, will be rewarded by a larger return later.
Generally with social media ventures the plan is to establish growth of numbers first, by offering as clean & quality service as possible, lock people in via walled gardens & "network effect", and then make gradual introductions of ads, promoted posts, & payments for "premium services" that were once included.
The ATProtocol has WAY less potential for "walled garden" than most designs though - me being able to view & post to Bluesky via my completely separate WAFRN account is proof of that.
STILL, if a specifically for-profit org ponies up $100million of cash money, they are doing that in expectation of being able to make a lot more than that back.

katzenberger Mar 20

Does not add up.

Did they secure a $100 million funding en passant, while being otherwise "crazy busy and overwhelmed" by their development work?

And if they were instead crazy busy and overwhelmed precisely because of trying to secure that funding, what kept them from taking the final step of a press release?

That's not even fishy. It's an insult.

Mastodon Migration Mar 20

This is an absurd and transparent lie, that reflects very badly on Mike Masnick.

We are talking about a $100M investment, and he is asking people to believe they were just "too busy." Hogwash.

@[email protected] @[email protected]

And you know who can never be used to make that money back?

US!

We're FREE.

Folks like BSKY, idk why. But they'll either stay or they'll leave. If they leave, they're not going back to Twitter. If they stay, maybe they don't know or maybe they don't know how good we are. Or maybe they have something we need.

How can we turn this into a strength to HELP people move over?

Bonfire is AMAZING imo. It's not Mastodon. We have so many options, we just need to convince folks that this way is better and we can suit them however they need.

Mastodon Migration (@[email protected])

48K Posts, 1.6K Following, 34.1K Followers · Sharing advice and assisting with the great migration, plus various thoughts and perspectives. Banner Artwork: Julio Lacerda https://linktr.ee/julio.lacerda Avatar Artwork: Brandon Pilcher https://brandonpilchersart.com Individual account not representing any entity or organization. Curates: @[email protected] @[email protected] #mastodonmigration #twittermigration

Mastodon

Mike Fraser Mar 20

@_elena I'm not going to mince words here, that's either total bullshit from Mike or incompetence from the team, or both. You've just received 100 mil in the bank and you can't get a staffer to spend an hour writing a press release. The real hold up was figuring out how they were going to explain it which they still haven't done.

derptron Mar 20

@_elena He makes it sound like it's me trying to file my taxes on time or something. Anxiety disorder creating artificial roadblocks and "forgetting". I'm also the "CEO" of a software company but mine isn't going anywhere at all, like EVER.

I wonder if he's on SSI. I've been considering it...

And the whole team has it!!?? I'm sorry. That must be a real mess to manage. Does everyone panic at the same time or y'all take turns?

We take turns.

⁂ L. Rhodes Mar 20

@_elena I don't know what the going rate on hiring an intern is at the moment, but I bet $100 million would cover it.

Lee from Colorado Mar 20

@_elena Masnick has certainly revealed a previously hidden side of himself in all the BS BS ...

@[email protected] @[email protected]

I was at Red Hat when they were sold to IBM.

The CEO, Jim Whitehurst, that for some reason people saw as a god and didn't understand he didn't INVENT Linux or anything, was standing up there selling us the idea of the sale to IBM.

CEO's are only there to keep the business running. They're not there for the people, they're not there for the customers, they're there to make sure it just keeps humming along.

Even if they disagreed, they're not going to say it publicly. You know how much money that CEO job is making them? Say whatever, world be damned.

THIS is why they can't have this power.

They will ALWAYS convince themselves and anyone they can that this is BEST FOR ALL.

Lee from Colorado (@[email protected])

972 Posts, 846 Following, 814 Followers · Ally. He/him Posts about: Outdoors in Colorado & elsewhere, Tai Chi, Veg and plant-based food, Climate Change, Music, uspol. Hashtags >>> CWs. I tag my content, you decide to filter or not. Follow back after review, may take a week or two. No empty accounts. No boost-only accounts. Instant block for bigotry, personal attacks, hashtag spamming, AI slop. Posts auto-delete after a month

Mastodon 🐘

cognitively accessible math Mar 20

@_elena The whole 'gosh golly' thing ...

@[email protected] @[email protected] those silly businesses would forget about the law if they weren't reminded! It happens to us ALL!

cognitively accessible math (@[email protected])

16.1K Posts, 1.29K Following, 646 Followers · I'm at Parkland College (for a few decades) helping folks navigate developmental courses/placements (but fighting the "hey, 5% of these folks could pass college so we should just get rid of developmental teaching" trends) dreaming of structured paths for building understanding *and* fluency instead of "I don't have time to teach you, here's a calculator." See https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jvTlNmNI7nC9xMrVp2cc3d5RjWnpho0exwA_t86eWbI/edit?usp=sharing

Mathstodon

Androcat Mar 20

@_elena Bain probably requested the blackout so the targets wouldn't suspect...

@androcat @_elena Yes, because the pre-IPO assessments said: "Platform users, many of whom were disappointed in the 2024 election outcome, may scoff at the idea of a Bluesky IPO, believing profit-driven decisions led to the usability issues at X and Threads (namely, link throttling, excessive low-quality ads, and algorithm annoyances)"*.

They want number go up, you know, to the moon.

* https://accessipos.com/bluesky-stock-ipo/

Bluesky Stock: Who Owns Bluesky, and Will it IPO?

Explore opportunities to own Bluesky stock before the Bluesky IPO. Follow along as the startup grows into a public company.

Access IPOs

@_elena "Oops, we were just too busy. Tee hee!"

They had a freaking YEAR...

It takes, what? Like ten seconds to make a post that says "btw, we just got a whole bunch of VC funding."

Anthony Bosio Mar 20

@_elena They had previously announced other crypto investment, so I would not think it was that aspect.

https://bsky.social/about/blog/10-24-2024-series-a

Bluesky Announces Series A to Grow Network of 13M+ Users - Bluesky

Bluesky now exceeds 13 million users, the AT Protocol developer ecosystem continues to grow, and we’ve shipped highly requested features like direct messages and video.

Bluesky

TC Won't Give In To Lies Mar 23

It's a Jack Dorsey creation. I'll never trust him and therefore never will trust #Bluesky

leberschnitzel Mar 20

@_elena I mean, I run a mastodon, I'd surely not forget to disclose that!

@_elena
Just out of interest - any of the bluesky-bridged-to-fediverse accounts posting about this?

benjamim Mar 20

@_elena Next Space Karen buys Bluesky for $44 billion

@[email protected] @[email protected] He's foolish, he's not THAT foolish. He'd pay no more than $40 billion this time.

benjamim (@[email protected])

63 Posts, 443 Following, 49 Followers · "For the first time in history you can simply post HE'S AN IDIOT and 90% of the world will know who you're talking about" Mi skribas en malbona Portugala, Angla kaj Esperanto lingvoj.

Vivaldi Social

tunneltoast Mar 20

@_elena if trump supports it, then it must be really bad

swggrkllr3rd Mar 20

@_elena Russian oligarchs ?? https://www.dw.com/en/what-do-xs-alleged-ties-to-russian-oligarchs-mean-for-musk/a-70088598

What X's alleged ties to Russian oligarchs mean for Musk

A US court filing has forced X owner Elon Musk to reveal the identities of the social media platform's investors. The move could have far-reaching repercussions.

Deutsche Welle

nickapos Mar 20

@_elena Mastodon data are open too….
But yeah blue sky has crypto investors it will be monetised for sure

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Mar 20

@nickapos @_elena

yeah but there's a difference between someone screenscraping your posts somewhere

and a financially motivated effort by seedy cryptobros *on the inside* linking all sorts of private data

- using your email and birthdate to link to other plutocrat data silos

- ingesting your private messages

- profiling your posting behavior

- feeding it all to AI

etc