Bluesky is a successful social media platform. It has millions of users and all of the coolest aging millennials. In case you are unfamiliar with Bluesky, it is the text-forward social media platform that is, in the broadest sense, a replacement for what Twitter used to be.

In its heyday, Twitter’s impact was always larger than its footprint. In terms of users, it was (and still is) dwarfed by Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook. But – thanks to its early courting and verification of celebrities and journalists – it became a de facto source for shrinking newsrooms and TV productions. Journalists used it to break news, celebrities used it for official announcements, and so it became a news cycle mainstay even as Internet users preferred Instagram’s glossy images and Facebook’s engagement slurry.

The folks who have departed Twitter for Bluesky are, broadly, happy to have done so: While the former has an AI chatbot that declared itself “MechaHitler,” the latter offers robust safety and privacy measures. On Bluesky, I can mute individuals or all replies to a post. Muting words (“trump”) hides not just posts with the word, but any posts with the chosen word within a link, description, or image. I can turn off comments entirely. I can disable all quote-tweets, or just the one by the guy who annoyed me. There are fencers with fewer parries.

Not that I have much of a need to block people on Bluesky. I’m there to make jokes, talk about sports, and make jokes about sports. Oh, and to occasionally share photos of birds I saw. The people I follow all makes jokes and/or talk about sports as well, with the exception of those who share photos of birds. There are other ways to curate your feed, I’m sure, but I’m not interested in them and will not endorse them. I’m there to have a good time, and I do. Anyone else’s failure to do so is a skill issue.

I saw a news story that said something about Bluesky not having enough users. I don’t know about that. I have more followers than I ever did on Twitter despite being much less interesting than I was a decade ago. Bots seem less prevalent on Bluesky than on Twitter. Actual human engagement – outbound traffic from links, investment in projects – is, in my experience and others’ anecdotes, much stronger on Bluesky than on Twitter. Therefore I can confidently report that Bluesky has enough users, and anyone who says otherwise is like one of those sports fans that thinks they’re the GM of the team: more interested in who should be cut and cap hits than drinking some cold ones and watching the game.

I have also recently become aware – against my will – that one or a handful of Politics People don’t like Bluesky because Bluesky users have pointed out, repeatedly, all of the things they have been wrong about, which is everything for the last 10-16 years. These Thought Leaders – I dare not award them the label “journalist” – are sometimes labeled as liberal, and perhaps believe themselves to be, but they have the same spine as the entrenched Democratic Party leadership and annelids. They have the pragmatism of Neville Chamberlain and will sell anyone out to fascism’s gaping maw because they’re confident they can survive it (or, worse, that they will thrive in it). They are not allies of democracy; they are not allies to anyone or anything but their own bottom line. Their dislike of Bluesky is another sign that the platform is cool and great. You absolutely should not listen to them about anything, including their thoughts on social media platforms.

Listen to me instead: Bluesky is great! Follow me and I will prove it to you.