Tracking the many social-media migrations

Last week, I joined Bluesky, the new hotness in social platforms. It’s the latest refuge for those who have beef with the way Elon Musk runs Twitter. Last November, I queued up to rejoin Mastodon, the existing-but-revitalized platform that was the first beneficiary of agita over Musk’s Twitter takeover.

Despite boarding the outbound train relatively early, I still maintain Twitter accounts for myself and the things I make. All that is to say, I’m experiencing these three platforms all at once and finding them very different from one another in more than the obvious ways.

Being on Mastodon feels different than being on Bluesky, which is not like today’s Twitter. This despite the fact that a lot of people besides me appear to maintain accounts and even continue posting on all three. In my feed, the multiplatformers tend to be journalists of the tech and general-interest varieties, along with an array of other content creators.…