Bluesky is rolling out some fresh ideas to make conversations on its platform feel better, including a new “dislike” button. This experiment aims to help you see less of what you don’t like in your Discover feed. It’s part of the company’s broader push to improve how people communicate online.
Many of these new tests are based on something Bluesky calls “social proximity.” Imagine your social life as a neighborhood; Bluesky wants to show you posts and replies from people in your “social neighborhood”—folks you already chat with or would probably enjoy knowing. The company thinks that by focusing on these connections, conversations will feel more familiar, relevant, and less likely to cause misunderstandings.
So, the new dislike button, which will be private (meaning others won’t see you hit it), will tell the system what kinds of posts you’d prefer to skip. This feedback could also change how replies show up in your threads and even in the threads of people near you in your “social neighborhood.”
Bluesky already lets users limit who can reply to their posts, for example, only people who follow them. But as their CTO, Paul Frazee, pointed out, they don’t want that to be the only choice. They’re also tinkering with the Reply button itself. Instead of jumping straight into a blank post, you’ll now see the whole conversation thread first when you tap it. Combined with new tech to spot bad replies, Bluesky hopes these changes will lead to a nicer vibe overall.
Some people see these changes as Bluesky giving users more control over what they see, similar to how it handles notifications. Others worry that this “social neighborhood” idea might create “filter bubbles,” where users see only content they agree with, rather than truly addressing broader problems with moderation.
Recently, Bluesky has faced criticism from users who feel the platform isn’t doing enough to remove accounts that break its rules. If people stay in their “social neighborhood,” they might not see offensive posts, and those posting them might not see their critics. This could reduce fights, but it might also shut down useful disagreements.
