If you’re a regular on X/Twitter or have been keeping an eye on tech news recently you may have noticed a lot of chatter about moving to Bluesky. Bluesky is a social media platform that works in pretty much the same way as old Twitter used to do, but without Elon Musk’s interventions. You can post messages, like and share etc. We don’t quite know what the word for tweeting on Bluesky is though. So why has Bluesky suddenly become a platform of interest. For many people X/Twitter in it’s current state has become a less pleasant experience thanks to AI bots, the removal of the block facility and the allowance of misinformation, some of which has even been shared by Musk himself. The number of tweets you can see has become limited unless you pay a subscription. All these factors have started to upset users of the platform and high profile posters have started to seek out new locales for chat. Bluesky seems to be the current destination of choice. Since Trump became Preseident Elect over 1 million people have signed up to Bluesky and there’s a rolling snowball of interest as more and more people look to an alternative to X. The Guardian, this week, announced that they’ll stop posting to X due to it being a “toxic platform” and even more shocking is that the Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol has also decided to announce their departure from the platform.
Joining Bluesky
Joining Bluesky is very easy. You simply enter your email address and date of birth, choose a handle/username and create a password. You have to verify you’re human and that’s it. If you’re lucky you’ll be able to have the same identity as you have on X/Twitter but we found that both personal and business ids were already taken. Therefore loquax is loquaxuk which is fine because it’s the same id we have for Instagram/Threads but also a tad annoying because it’s different to Facebook and X. Once you’ve signed up it’s a case of finding accounts you want to follow and doing everything you know you can do on X. We’ve not spent that much time looking round the platform but in general it feels – at least in terms of usability – much the same as X. One interesting option we noticed was that users can create “Starter Packs”. These are a list of accounts that “let you easily share your favourite feeds and people with your friends”. For compers and competitions that could be particularly useful as it would allow a newbie to sign-up, head to Loquax’s account (for example) and immediately follow a bunch of accounts recommended by us that are perfect for compers. Of course that’s purely from a comping point of view but if you have other interests such as photography, movies, TV shows, celebrities, academia etc then it might be worth seeking out “Starter Packs” to help you discover who is currently on the platform.
But Is It Any Good For Compers?
Recently one lucky Loquax user posted that they’d had a win from a prize draw that was posted on Bluesky. They mentioned that they were happier using Bluesky over X but there were not many competitions on there. We tried to find some and found a few using the term “repost to win”. For example Bert’s Books are giving away a £100 book subscription (ends midday 17/11) and we even spotted someone giving away a Charlatan’s bobble hat. We also tried some searches with hashtags like #win and #prizedraw which felt better than X searches but yielded little. It’s also not possible to filter out posts by country which would be ideal (Instagram would be sooo much better with this). In short it’s slim pickings for compers looking to jump on the Bluesky wagon early doors but if you’re looking for low entry, small prize giveaways then it might be worth a quick scan through every now and then. If more and more bigger brands start looking at Bluesky then it might become a bit more interesting at least as a resource for prize finding. Our view is that at the moment it feels a little bit like Threads which had a lot of initial interest but everyone still prefers Instagram as their prize giving platform of choice.
Will We Be Including Bluesky Competitions?
If we or any contributor spots a Bluesky prize draw or competition then it can be listed on Loquax. For now we don’t have a dedicated section so instead if any are uploaded then they’ll be in the web competition section but indicated with (Bluesky). At the moment (November 2024) we don’t intend to create icons, listings page or opt-outs as we do with Instagram, X and Facebook. It’s fairly easy for us to do but we don’t want to end up with a Threads/Pinterest situation. What we mean by that is we spend time sorting out the relevant requirements only to to then find that there’s insufficient interest or giveaways to include. We should also state that we’re not going to be actively searching Bluesky on a regular basis for prize draws. There’s only so many platforms and searches we can do – and can financially justify doing – so unless it really takes off then we’ll not be spending a lot of time on that platform seeking out competitions. If Bluesky obviously develops to be a good source of comps – and they’re easy to find – then naturally we’ll adapt accordingly.
Is Loquax On Bluesky?
We have signed up to Bluesky and you can find us at loquaxuk. However we struggle enough with being social on Facebook, Instagram and X so adding another platform to our roster will only happen if it’s worth doing. We do have accounts on Tiktok, Threads and Pinterest for example but haven’t bothered with any of them because we don’t have time for them (we’ve no idea how to do a Tiktok) or we don’t think they’re worthwhile or we simply just don’t remember to post on them and fulfill our destiny as a top competition and prize draw influencer (lol). But if you are on Bluesky do feel free to give us a follow and a mention. We aren’t planning on leaving X – the loss of the Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol hasn’t swayed us but if The Severn Bridges pack up then that might be a bridge too far for even us and we’ll say adieu to Elon. However all these social platforms are fine but the best place to know what’s happening on Loquax is on our forums. That’ll be the first spot we update you with any site news or interesting comping snippets. If bridges entered competitions and joined Loquax we’re pretty sure they’d not want to leave. Overall Bluesky might be worth a sign-up if you enjoyed Twitter pre-Elon for activity outside comping. It might also worth be doing during this current purple patch in case of low entry giveaways. However you’re not going to find significant volumes of prizes draws along the lines of Instagram.