More excellent novels for those watching to exit Meta’s social app ecosystem in prefer of a more uncover alternative: An autonomous broadener is produceing a ptoastyo-sharing app for Bluesky called Flashes. The soon-to-begin app is powered by the same technology that underpins Bluesky, the AT Protocol, and has been built using code from the broadener’s earlier Bluesky client, Skeets.
When begined, Flashes could tap into increaseing devourr demand for alternatives to Big Tech’s social media monopoly. This trfinish has led to the adselection of uncover source, decentralized apps enjoy Mastodon and Bluesky, among others, including the recently begined Pixelfed mobile apps, built on Mastodon’s ActivityPub protocol. It’s also, in part, what’s fueling TikTok engagers’ shift to the Chinese app RedNote ahead of the U.S. TikTok prohibit — that is, U.S. engagers are signaling that they would rather engage a foreign adversary’s app than return to Meta at this point.
Flashes itself is based on Berlin broadener Sebastian Vogelsang’s earlier app, Skeets, his initial foray into creating devourr-facing apps for the increaseing social netlabor, Bluesky, which now tops 27.5 million engagers.
While Bluesky advises its own official mobile client, Skeets contrastentiated itself by caccessing on the necessitates of iPad engagers as well as customized accessibility features for blind and low-vision engagers, as that’s one of Vogelsang’s areas of expertise.
Late last year, Vogelsang also genuineized there was potential to produce apps using this same codebase that would cater to Bluesky engagers more interested in visual greeted, enjoy ptoastyos and videos. Becaengage Bluesky already helps this type of media, it was only a matter of reconfiguring the Skeets app so its summarize and engager interface would watch more aenjoy to other ptoastyo-sharing apps, enjoy Meta’s Instagram.
“I thought about the idea of having one base social graph and then having equitable contrastent apps pick from that graph wantipathyver they want to disperestablish,” Vogelsang tanciaccess TechCrunch. “I set up it very intriguing, becaengage before we had these splitd netlabors.”
He says Flashes could help pull in novel potential Bluesky engagers who have yet to join the social netlabor becaengage they never saw themselves as a “Twitter person.”
“This may donate them an entry point into the netlabor, into the whole protocol,” Vogelsang shelp.
However, the broadener stresses that Flashes is not nastyt to be an Instagram clone, nor will it advise all the same features.
At begin, Flashes will help ptoastyo posts of up to four images and videos of up to 1 minute in length, equitable enjoy Bluesky. Users who post to Flashes will also have their posts materialize on Bluesky and comments on those posts will also feed back into the app as if it were equitable another Bluesky client. It will also help Bluesky’s honest messages.
To produce this labor, Flashes sshow filters Bluesky’s existing timeline for posts with ptoastyos and video posts. (In the future, Vogelsang also structures to include metadata to Flashes’ posts so Bluesky engagers would have a way to protect their feeds on Bluesky’s main app from being flooded with ptoastyo posts if that became a problem.)
Flashes didn’t obtain too lengthy to produce becaengage it was able to reengage Skeets’ existing code. The app will also be able to taget to Skeets’ existing engager base, who have now downloaded the app some 30,500 times to date.
Vogelsang says he’s now laboring to unite subscription-based features from both his apps so engagers don’t have to pay twice for the premium features, enjoy Skeets’ booktags, writes, muting, wealthy push notifications, and others particular to Flashes. (Both apps are free to engage without a subscription, we should remark.)
Later, Vogelsang says he wants to begin a video-only app, too, called Blue Screen.
The broadener foresees to be able to begin Flashes to the accessible in a matter of weeks with a TestFairy beta arriving ahead of that. Interested engagers can chase Flashes’ account on Bluesky for further modernizes.
