Public Outcry Over Bluesky Allowing Racist Usernames
Over the past few years, various alternatives to Twitter have emerged, such as Spill, Mastodon, Steemit, and Threads. These platforms offer users the opportunity to switch from Twitter, particularly if they are dissatisfied with its ownership by Elon Musk. Interestingly, even the former CEO of Twitter, Jack Dorsey, is actively participating in the competition to establish the leading microblogging platform with his Bluesky Social. However, unlike Twitter, Bluesky operates as a decentralized platform, where data is stored on independent servers rather than servers owned by the company.
While this may sound like the perfect platform to jump into, a recent incident on the platform has hinted at potential moderation issues.
Racial slurs from Bluesky
Over the past week, several people have reported seeing racially offensive usernames on Bluesky. Shockingly, this recent case involved a user who had the n-word in his username and was allowed to register it on the platform. According to Bluesky’s statement, they received several complaints from users about an account with the n-word in its user handle.
“On Wednesday, users reported an account with a dirty handle. This handle was against our community rules, and it was our mistake that allowed it to be created,” Bluesky said. The account was removed from the platform within 40 minutes, and the code that allowed the creation of similar handles was also fixed.
In addition, Bluesky went on to clarify that there were “significant investments” in the trust and security team, and to handle the growing user base, it would continue to invest in “monitoring, feedback and support systems.”
The biggest difference between Bluesky Social and Twitter is moderation. The social media platform has moderation policies that can be drawn up with the help of third-party service providers. While it uses an automatic filtering system, the platform also allows for community tagging, allowing users to tag things manually. But if this case is anything to go by, it looks like people are finding loopholes in the platform’s policies.
Bluesky is accused of having an “anti-blackness” problem
But before the Bluesky team issued a statement, a LinkedIn post by Data Mesh Radio host Scott Hirleman went viral, accusing the platform and its leaders, including CEO Jay Graber, of having an “unbelievably bad anti-blackness problem.”
“If you don’t want to maintain a social media platform, split the company in two and focus on the protocol and fund the platform with another team that cares. Or don’t you care about marginalized groups?”, Hirleman wrote.
