Leah Fieger: And with me in studio is WIRED reporter Vittoria Elliot. Hey, Tori.
Vittoria Elliot: Hey, Leah.
Leah Fieger: Friends, how are you? Which social media platform are you on right now?
Vittoria Elliot: A violent question if I'm honest. I'm totally on BlueSky.
Leah Fieger: Yes?
Vittoria Elliot: Oh yes.
Leah Fieger: Ok.
Vittoria Elliot: I'm just walking outside and people are following me. This is the lowest lift of any platform I have had to join for some time.
Leah Fieger: So you just like the attention?
Vittoria Elliot: I just like the attention. I love getting little pings of affirmation on my phone every day.
Leah Fieger: This is what Twitter used to be for many people. David, you're on BlueSky too, right?
David Gilbert: I am sure. After all, I'm stalking you too, Leah.
Leah Fieger: I know. I had to beg for it. This was disturbing.
David Gilbert: Although I am very busy. I have a lot of new followers to check out.
Leah Fieger: To participate.
David Gilbert: Yes.
Leah Fieger: Very rude. So what's going on? Do you guys like it more than X now? It seems to me that there has been a mass exodus, not just of journalists but of left-leaning people across the board. What are the reasons for this?
David Gilbert: At least for me it's less triggering. It is less toxic. It's easy to stay there for a while and scroll through and not get excited by some stupid thing said by someone who recently turned to X. And I think I'm just happier spending time there. The connection feels more natural, authentic. Instead of people shouting all the time, there is just talking. And I don't know, it's still very early days and I think it could potentially be really cool, but it could also potentially be terrible because it's the Internet.
Leah Fieger: The CEO says they are getting one million users per day. That's a wild situation.
Vittoria Elliot: Yes. I mean, so I agree with David, the user experience is better. I mean, even though it's a little slow to load because they're attracting so many people so quickly, it's a platform that you feel is not designed to waste all your attention. So if you notice like an And Bluesky doesn't work that way. It feels like the old social media where you're like, I'm here to see the things I want to see, but it's not designed in a way that makes me feel like the end goal is just to make me lose as much. Spend as much time as possible on this website.