“For Twitter to deserve public trust, it must be politically neutral, which effectively means upsetting the far right and the far left equally,” said Elon Musk, a self-proclaimed free speech absolutist who had bought Twitter in 2022.
X has now suspended numerous accounts voicing support for widespread anti-government protests in Turkey, following requests from Turkish courts – a move that has sparked a user-led boycott.
After the arrest of İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, President Erdoğan’s top rival, on March 19, widespread street protests erupted across the country. Some users supporting student-led protests found their X accounts suspended in Turkey, making their posts inaccessible to users in the country. A US-based news publication Politico reports that activist Omer Faruk Aslan created a second account to avoid censorship: “Yesterday, my account was blocked by a court order because my tweets exceeded 6 million views."
“Most of the suspended accounts belonged to university-linked activists who were mainly sharing details about protests and places where students could gather,” said Yusuf Can, a coordinator and analyst at the Wilson Center's Middle East Program, to Politico.
The suspensions sparked criticism of X’s stance on freedom of expression, prompting many users to ditch the platform for Bluesky, a decentralized social media app.
Selin Öztunçman
The rise of decentralized social platforms
Decentralization means that this platform isn’t at the mercy of a single owner or corporation when it comes to moderation, free speech and algorithmic decisions. If it’s shut down or censored, by design, it will continue to run from another IP address.
The open-source nature of the app provides clear information on how things work, as opposed to X where operational information remains secretive.
Bluesky was established in 2019 as a research initiative under Twitter, led by Jack Dorsey. In 2021, following Dorsey’s departure, the platform severed its ties with Twitter. Jay Graber, a 34-year-old American software engineer, became the microblogging site’s new CEO.
Unlike X, Bluesky promises not to impose a manipulated algorithm or promote content from a certain political alignment.
Füsun Sarp Nebil, a Turkish technology writer, summarizes X with these three words: centralized power, toxicity and manipulation. Whereas, Bluesky is described as: freedom, privacy and control.
Migration to Bluesky
Since Musk’s takeover of X, the platform has gradually seen users migrate to Bluesky worldwide.
In September 2024, three million users joined Bluesky after the Brazilian government's ban on X.
Musk’s appointment to a role in Trump’s administration also saw a record surge of new sign-ups, edging over 27 million.
Public figures, civilians, politicians, newspapers, and corporations are migrating to Bluesky, all searching for a fairer place.
Yazan:
Selin Öztunçman
Londra’da Gazetecilik okudu. Yazılarında günümüzün kültürel, sosyal ve politik dinamiklerine farklı bir bakış açısı sunmaya çalışıyor.
