In the weeks since the election and in the midst the giant surge of new accounts on Bluesky, I’ve seen multiple people talking about bad vibes on the site due to the questionable online behavior of some users. Alas, the moderation tools do not include the option to delete other people’s accounts. But for what it’s worth, here are a few things I do that help my experience.
1. Block block block.
Bluesky’s famed nuclear block works — blocked accounts disappear from your timeline and your mentions disappear from theirs. Blocking anyone who behaves badly to anyone is a great way to avoid bad vibes taking over your account and spreading to others.
But be aware that blocks are public and can be seen via third party sites like clearsky.app, which many people don’t mind at all but others may feel is a security risk.
2. Report before blocking when appropriate.
Reporting posts and accounts to the moderators didn’t do anything on Twitter at the time I left. But I’ve seen Bluesky’s moderators ban scammers, impersonators, and certain other bad actors. Sadly, as we have learned, they don’t ban everyone many users believe they should. But reporting bad accounts and posts is still an important part of keeping the site safer than it would be otherwise. I recommend making it a habit.
3. Use moderation lists – with care.
Subscribing to other people’s moderation lists is one way to mute or block a bunch of accounts someone else has classified as mute or blockworthy. The problem is that some bad actors have created block lists to trick people into blocking non-blockworthy people, so if you use a moderation list, be sure you trust the person who’s put it together.
That being said, I’ve been very happy with a handful of blocklists I’ve subscribed to — they’ve preemptively blocked a legion of bigots and trolls for me.
YMMV, but some of the folks on this starter pack have moderation lists that might be worth checking out.
4. Don’t participate in follow-back games or pressure.
If you automatically follow back thousands of people, you’ll almost certainly end up following right wing ops who are pretending to be friendly but will eventually try to poison your timeline. You’ll probably also end up following a lot of bots.
Also, following back a bunch of people who are just reposting the same tired memes is going to make your timeline tedious and useless. And if you’re following 10,000 people, real folks who check out your profile may think you’re a bot and possibly block you. Don’t fall into that trap!
5. Don’t follow those big “de-activist” accounts…
…that claim to be fighting Trump but just post a bunch of slogans and memes without ever telling you to call your reps or support your local mutual aid groups or libraries or do anything but follow and share.
In my opinion, those accounts are wasting your time.
Instead, I look for accounts that provide good information and practical suggestions for things to actually DO instead of just sharing memes.
Here are my Practical Politics starter pack and my Always Something We Can Do starter pack for your consideration.
6. Follow independent news outlets and local news outlets…
…instead of the big billionaire owned national political press outlets. Again, less outrage bait, more actual, usable, actionable info.
Here’s my starter pack of local news outlets. And Mindy Weisberger has also put together a great starter pack of independent, worker-owned, and reader-funded media.
7. Don’t feel bad about unfollowing people…
…even me, ha ha! Seriously, I can be a lot on social media. Unfollow me if it’s too much! Unfollow anyone you like!
Starter packs are great ’cause they’ve given folks a way to fill up a timeline fast. But you don’t have to keep following EVERYONE. Tailor your feed to keep the voices you wanna hear from. It’s okay to let others go!
8. Block reply guys (and reply bots)
There have been multiple waves of bad faith reply guys on Bluesky — some of whom are actually bots. If you get a weird drive-by negative reply, check out the account and if all they do is make weird replies, block ’em! Or block and report ’em! Excessive unwanted replies is a reportable thing here.
9. Block anyone you want
You can also just block anyone you want for bad vibes. Life is short and we’re not politicians holding town halls who are required to listen to everyone. We’re just chilling on our lawns here; if someone shows up who you don’t want on your lawn, just block ’em. It’s fine.
10. Block Singal
11. Block professional trolls
There’s a category of professional troll that monetizes conflict online. On Twitter, everyone would quote dunk them, which is exactly what they wanted — they’d use all that negative attention to gin up excitement from their supporters and direct it to their crowdfunding or newsletters or whatever.
Folks have done a pretty good job of NOT helping those professional trolls make money on Bluesky. Just block ’em. Don’t dunk. Don’t fight. Just block. The silence is the worst thing they can imagine, and many of them eventually give up and go away. Here, I made this for us as a reminder:
12. Delete your own viral posts if you want
If you happen to post something that gets a lot of attention and it stresses you out, IT’S TOTALLY COOL TO JUST DELETE IT! I’ve often deleted posts that start to go viral right before I go to bed. I gotta sleep; I don’t need to worry about this post! It’s fine; it’s your timeline!
I’m not even talking about posts that people are responding to negatively here; I’m talking about any post that gets a lot of attention. Sometimes it’s too much. It’s fine to just delete it.
13. Avoid fighting
This is entirely personal and YMMV (of course YMMV applies to everything here), but I avoid fighting at all online.
I’ll have a discussion from time to time with people who disagree with me if I think it’s actually good faith. But most people coming in hot are looking to fight, not actually talk.
So if anyone tries to pick a fight, I usually just block. If anyone goes straight for insults, I just block. Again, we’re not elected officials here. We’re not obliged to listen to abusive people as if they’re our constituents. Block, block, report and block.
14. Some things are just for friends
Cultivate friends to whom you can text certain things in private instead of posting every thought in public. In the earlier days of Bluesky, I think it was easier to post any ol’ thing ’cause it was just us weirdos, ha ha! But there are MILLIONS of folks on the site now, and any post can go big. And when certain posts go big, they can be misinterpreted by strangers who just don’t get the tone or context. Folks call this context collapse. Didn’t happen so much a year ago – happens ALL THE TIME now.
So it’s nice to have friends you can text stuff to directly when there’s a thought you HAVE to share but don’t need to share with 25 million people. (Thanks, Jeff Parker and Preeti Chhibber!)
15. Block ops
There are a wide range of bad actors trying to test boundaries on the site right now. Be very wary of anyone who seems to be nudging you to approve of anything that could get you a call from the authorities. Just block block block.
There are also right wingers pretending to be left wing or marginalized people on here — but they’re actually mocking left wing or marginalized people. If you go a few posts down, you’ll usually find some kind of tip off. Be careful.
16. Don’t spread unverified junk
There are lots of folks with whom you might agree politically who post screenshots of supposed headlines or breaking news but don’t include any links to actual sources. Don’t share that crap. Those could be ops. They could also just be WRONG. Don’t share unverified stuff. It’s bad for all of us.
17. Watch out for follow farmers
Be wary of accounts that follow over 5K people, post nothing but political memes, use “A.I.” images, and participate in follow back hashtags/farming. Some of these folks are real, and apologies to you if you’re one of those and you are real! But I suspect a lot may be bots, some may be ops, and many may just distract instead of activate you.
18. Feel free to limit who can reply to you
If you’re getting a lot of weird replies, try out the gray “anyone can interact” button on the bottom left of the post field. That will bring up options for limiting who can interact with your post. You can limit it to people you mention in your post or people you follow.
I’d personally like to be able to expand those options a bit and include replies from people who follow me. Most of the off-tone replies I get come from people who don’t follow me. So including just that bit of friction would allow more people to reply but still head off some weirdness.
19. Temporary deactivating is an option
Bluesky does not yet allow for us to take our accounts private, which is a big safety feature that I think they absolutely need to implement as soon as possible. But as I understand it, folks can deactivate their accounts and reactivate them later. So if you need a break, that might be an option.
I haven’t deactivated and reactivated personally, so before you try it, you might want to test it on a dummy account to make sure it actually works and doesn’t delete your account, ha ha!
20. Follow accounts that activate instead of depress you
These are stressful times! And I think a lot of us follow a lot of accounts because we want to know what’s going on and what we can do. And that’s good! But sometimes some accounts may amp up our stress unhelpfully. And that may be different accounts for different people!
But in generally, I try to focus on accounts that share good info and/or actual suggestions of things to do. Not so interested in accounts that just post memes about how bad the other side is. I’m repeating myself a bit, and again, ymmv, but never feel bad about unfollowing and curating your feed.
FWIW, here’s a starter pack of people I particularly like following on here for good info, good vibes, or good suggestions about practical ways to help during these trying times. go.bsky.app/6DoVMhY
21. Use alt text
When you post an image on Bluesky, you have the option of including a text description. That’s alt text, and it’s critical for making the site accessible for users with vision issues. Alt text also shows up in searches, so it makes your posts more likely to be found by folks looking for certain keywords. And many users won’t repost images that don’t include alt text, so including alt text makes sense on a purely selfish level.
But it’s the right thing to do and it’s easy, so please do it regardless. If you need the reminder, you can go into Settings > Accessibility > Alt text to click a button that will require you to add alt text before you post images.
Worth noting: many so-called “activist” accounts don’t use alt text, which is in my mind another indicator of their lack of real interest in genuinely sticking up for others.
And that’s what I’ve got for now! I’ll add to this post as more occurs to me. In the meantime, be safe and be good!
