Longread about social media and other tech platform bias.
Bluesky, Eurosky, Mastodon and academic metrics.
So Bluseky did a $100m VC deal last April and didn't tell anyone. Wooaa. Hidden agenda or what? Bluesky is without doubt the corporate big tech alternative to XTwtr, and Bluesky users are about to find that out. Ads, blue ticks, premium content/accounts etc etc. Everyone in the work or influencer community think Bluesky is the professional solution choice. This now includes the EU zone seeking to build Eurosky, a frankly naïve and rather silly attempt to have 'their own' sovereign socmed.
Well. Bluseky has never worked for me, or probably anyone like me. Zero followers beyond the nice people from Mastodon who also use BS, and some stragglers from random starter packs, with big names and zero interest in nobodies like me. After that, grifters: people selling books, health supplements, gofundme issues or startup ideas. No one ever engages, there is literally zero social aspects to BS. Big academic names do well, prominent political voices, vibey influence types, news sources or famous tech people all do well. The algorithms like them. But ordinary people? Not a chance.
In Mastodon there are people who have more than 50k followers. There are also many people who have less than 1k, like me. But we all get a fair crack. Everyone is 'seen' in the same way. Hashtag boosts really work. Your followers have actually made the decision to follow you. There is very little starter pack behaviour. I get a lot of interaction and social aspects to being in the Mastodon community.
I had 1 boost and 1 like (same person) on BS for a post about my recent paper. In contrast, I had an interaction with a quite prominent academic in a conversation thread, plus 7 boosts and 6 likes from different people, on Mastodon, 2 different posts.
The only metrics that are seen by academic Altmetrics are any that are visible in Bluesky. This can include bridgey Fed Mastodon interactions, but all others are missed. In other business circles this would be called fixing the playing field to only value some companies, but not others. Bias, in other words. Metrics in academic contexts are important. They give traction to the work and even influence your chance at jobs, or research funding. But yours are only counted if youre on Bluesky.
This works the same for LinkedIn (I suspect it can also see Facebook etc). There is no justifyable reason that things work like this, other than companies and academic people basically being ignorant, or in bed with the big tech platforms. Luckily, a lot of European orgs and unis choose Mastodon, for its genuine value and total independence.
#academia #academicchatter #metrics #analytics #bigtech #bluesky #mastodon
