How are custom feeds reshaping our social media experiences?

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Study Information

We're looking for anyone who has created or maintains a custom feed on Bluesky to participate in a one-time interview!

1. Duration: 1 hour online, via Zoom
2. Format: Conversational interview about your experiences with Bluesky feeds
3. Privacy: All responses are confidential and anonymized
4. Compensation: $20 online gift card

To sign up, please fill out our brief screener form, and a study team member will be in contact shortly to schedule a time that works best for you.

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Who are we?

Hello! 👋 We are researchers in the Social Futures Lab at the University of Washington broadly interested in understanding Bluesky feed creator practices and experiences.

What is this project about?

For decades, centralized social media platforms have controlled what users see through opaque, top-down algorithms. While today these algorithms have grown to excel at generating engagement based on large-scale behavioral data and predictive models, users have little say in what content appears in their feeds or prioritizing the content that they want to see.

Bluesky's custom feeds represent a fundamental shift to this approach, providing a unique opportunity for any user on the platform to create, share, and subscribe to their own feed algorithms. This opens up exciting possibilities for user agency and community-driven content.

As this ecosystem of new feeds grows, we're particularly interested in understanding:

1. How are feed creators building and maintaining feeds as they grow? What practices emerge and what challenges arise?
2. What motivates creators to sustain their feeds, beyond hobbyist experiments into thriving communities?
3. How might custom feeds become a fully viable alternative to centralized recommendation systems: and what would it take to get there?

Your experiences as a feed creator are pioneering new models for social media. By understanding what works, what's challenging, and what support you need, we hope to inform better tools and contribute to the broader vision of decentralized content curation!

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FAQ

What will you do with this research?

Our findings will be used to develop new tools and insights for feed creators and inform academic research on decentralized social media. We may publish papers or create resources for the Bluesky community.

Do you make money from this research?

No. We are not affiliated with Bluesky PBC or the AT Protocol; our goal is to understand and support the custom feed ecosystem.

Will my identity be kept private?

Yes. All interview responses are confidential and will be anonymized in any publications or presentations. We will not share your personal information, including your name or Bluesky identification.

I'm just a hobbyist. Can I still participate?

Absolutely! We want to understand the full spectrum of Bluesky feed creator experiences, from casual experiments to serious businesses.

This study has been approved by the University of Washington Human Subjects Division. If you have any questions or concerns, please reach out to the office at hsdinfo@uw.edu.