The Off Topic Topic

[Sheilbh]

I figure it's worth a try, you never know.  Maybe cutting political satire will prove to be the missing ingredient for the left.

Always think of when Peter Cook opened The Establishment club in London in the 60s, he said it was inspired by "those wonderful Berlin cabarets which did so much to prevent the rise of Adolf Hitler".

[Josquius]

Looks like bluesky has won the twitter 2 war. It's really taking off.

[Grey Fox]

It has the right look and it's available from Europe unlike when Threads launched.

The Quebec sphere joined BlueSky on Monday, I did too.

[Valmy]

And in the US:

https://www.newsweek.com/map-most-popular-baby-names-each-state-1976724

Holy shit, had no idea Liam was even a thing there let alone this hard.

I like how the #1 Girls name in Georgia is Georgia.

[crazy canuck]

And in the US:

https://www.newsweek.com/map-most-popular-baby-names-each-state-1976724

Holy shit, had no idea Liam was even a thing there let alone this hard.

I like how the #1 Girls name in Georgia is Georgia.

She'll always remember where she's from

[Syt]

Looks like bluesky has won the twitter 2 war. It's really taking off.

Registered a few months ago and it was deadsville. Checked back yesterday and quite a bit more lively. And a large chunk of accounts I used to follow on Twitter are now in BlueSky.

[Tamas]

Looks like bluesky has won the twitter 2 war. It's really taking off.

Registered a few months ago and it was deadsville. Checked back yesterday and quite a bit more lively. And a large chunk of accounts I used to follow on Twitter are now in BlueSky.

Any recommendations?

[celedhring]

After The Guardian left X, I was surprised to see that "La Vanguardia" - Catalonia's largest newspaper and very much right of center, has also done so.

I stopped using X just a few weeks after Musk took over. I used it mostly to follow the war in Ukraine and some other news accounts, and I have been able to
find that elsewhere.

[Razgovory]

And in the US:

https://www.newsweek.com/map-most-popular-baby-names-each-state-1976724

Holy shit, had no idea Liam was even a thing there let alone this hard.

I like how the #1 Girls name in Georgia is Georgia.

Yeah, but that's the country of Georgia.  In the state of Georgia the most popular girls name is Sakartvelo.

[Syt]

Looks like bluesky has won the twitter 2 war. It's really taking off.

Registered a few months ago and it was deadsville. Checked back yesterday and quite a bit more lively. And a large chunk of accounts I used to follow on Twitter are now in BlueSky.

Any recommendations?

BlueSky skews fairly left-ish (for obvious reasons) at the moment, so keep that in mind; though as the site grows this will likely change. They've seen some jump-growth after the Twitter ban in Brazil and another jump after the US elections and chances are it's at the point where it sees a bigger exodus (or at least co-use) of people from Twitter/Xchan.

I'd start with news orgs - NYT, Bloomberg, NPR, ProPublica and start branching out from there. Also be sure to look up any of the accounts you liked on Twitter - they might have migrated or crosspost between both sites now.

Also, for accounts you like, check if they have "Starter Packs" in their profiles - those are lists of profiles they recommend to follow and you can "follow all" with a click if you wish (or go through the list to be more selective). Discovery is a bit hit and miss IMO.

E.g. for nerdy stuff I recommend the Starshipper who posts about sci-fi starships and has Starter Pack lists for Game Creators, Writers & Journalists, Concept artists & designers, and a general one.

[Tamas]

Thanks

[Sheilbh]

Registered a few months ago and it was deadsville. Checked back yesterday and quite a bit more lively. And a large chunk of accounts I used to follow on Twitter are now in BlueSky.

Yeah BlueSky took off in the UK after the riots and I think we're seeing that elsewhere.

After The Guardian left X, I was surprised to see that "La Vanguardia" - Catalonia's largest newspaper and very much right of center, has also done so.

I saw some really interesting comments by the editor of the Press Gazette about it here - so she's trade press expert on media.

She said that it makes sense for publishers, as much as anything else because they've got limited resources and for UK publishers Twitter drives less than 1% of traffic.

But the challenge is with journalists (which is similar to the point in an article I posted about the Labour Party considering leaving Twitter after the riots). Publishers have stopped "Tweet first" approaches and also don't require people to be on Twitter, not least because the abuse has got so much worse.

But lots of journalists want to be on Twitter because it is still the social media network for news. So it's apparently actually still quite a good place to get sources - people from government, politics etc sliding into someone's DMs. It's also basically where journalists share their stories - and each other's stories and talk about it, as do think tankers and political types. So even as the Guardian comes off, lots of journalists may (at their discretion) still be participating pretty heavily there.

In a way it reminds me of the ridiculous scandal - I want to say from the 2000s - of a private Usenet group for DC and NYC journalists. It was basically a way for them to chat about what they were reporting and making gags etc. I think that's stuff that has always happened - I don't know if it's better that it happens in private or in public.

I also think the instantaneous nature of that conversation on Twitter (as opposed to when you're at the desk for Usenet, or end of the day at the bar before the internet) is maybe a bit of a problem. I wonder if it does cause a bit of herding and groupthink among journalists. I often remember during the Brexit debates (and you see the same in the US) lobby writers, in person watching a debate or press conference, Tweeting out jokes and re-tweeting each others - and a lot of it is what would end up in their copy. It's maybe good for reporters, but possibly not reporting.