What’s the difference between Mastodon, Bluesky, and Misskey? (lemmy.autism.place)

submitted 3 days ago by VanHalbgott@lemmy.autism.place to c/fediverse@lemmy.world

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[-] poVoq@slrpnk.net 26 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Misskey and Mastodon are two different types of open-source software for running a social media microblogging website that can interact with each other through the ActivityPub standard.

Bluesky is a similar but incompatible software run by a single company that was founded by ex-Twitter employees and is funded by billionaires and cryptocurrency scammers.

[-] b34k@lemmy.world 9 points 3 days ago

So what I’m hearing is… Bluesky is the only one that actually has a chance of going mainstream

[-] secret300@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 3 days ago

I don't understand why that's always true but yes

[-] jqubed@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

Any significant reason to make an account with Mastodon vs. Misskey (or I seem to remember the latter having several forks?)?

[-] kbal@fedia.io 3 points 3 days ago

It's the culture of an instance that makes the difference, not which software it runs, but there is often a correlation. Misskey tends to get more people who appreciate cute emoji and comfy vibes.

[-] Fitik@fedia.io 2 points 3 days ago

I prefer Misskey (Misskey fork at least) because it's just much more feature rich, Mastodon doesn't even have quotes, on the other hand Misskey has a lot of cool stuff like markdown, more customization, avatar decorations, emoji reactions etc But to each their own, from minuses Misskey has it's own API so the variety of apps is smaller compared to Mastodon

[-] admin@m.bohlenlabs.com 3 points 3 days ago

@poVoq @VanHalbgott You should brush up your knowledge of Bluesky. It has become open source. People have started to write plugins for it and people run their own instances that federate. And there is also a bridge to ActivityPub.

[-] poVoq@slrpnk.net 6 points 3 days ago

I didn't claim that it wasn't open-source. And a 3rd party bridge doesn't make it compatible with ActivityPub.

[-] RobotToaster@mander.xyz 2 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Self hosted instances are artificially limited to 10 accounts, however https://docs.bsky.app/blog/self-host-federation

And that's only the frontend "server" that can be self hosted, the "relay", that's more equivalent to a mastodon instance, doesn't seem to be self hostable.

[-] kyub@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

https://itsfoss.com/bluesky-vs-mastodon/ This is a comparison about Mastodon vs Bluesky.

Misskey is most similar to Mastodon. Bluesky is also a bit similar to both but still the most different one from the other two. All three are different social networks. Mastodon and Misskey are ActivityPub compatible, meaning they can "speak with" other ActivityPub compatible social networks, e.g. Lemmy, Pixelfed or PeerTube. Together, that's what's called the Fediverse (different federated social networks being able to talk to each other). Bluesky is based on a similar, but different protocol called AT Protocol. It also means it's possible for social network services using this protocol to be compatible to each other. But not sure if it's there in practice yet, if there are even other social networks using this, and so on.

I'd recommend using Mastodon, and in general ActivityPub compatible social network services. They're all open source, anyone can host a server (which is very important, because if the server operator ever does any bullsh!t you're not forced to stay there and still can remain on the social network, just from a different node), they're federated (servers can talk to each other and usually do unless some specific servers are blocked on purpose by the other server), and they're compatible with multiple services also using the same protocol. And there are "big" networks already existing using ActivityPub, most notably Mastodon and Lemmy of course. Also, Meta's Threads is also using ActivityPub, however some Mastodon instance hosts have decided to block Meta's servers (there are good reasons for doing so but explaining this would make this post even longer).

Bluesky is controlled by a company made by ex-Twitter employees, I think its federation capabilities are still limited right now(?), and one can't be so sure how its future is going to look like under these circumstances. We've all seen what happened to Twitter after Musk bought it, so I think only the true, unrestricted open source social network platforms like Mastodon, Lemmy, Pixelfed, Loops.video, PeerTube and so on are the future.

[-] nasi_goreng@lemmy.zip 4 points 3 days ago

Adding random information regarding Misskey. Misskey is specifically created to tackle Japanese internet culture and its own interpretation of fediverse.

For example, Misskey software allow the instance owner to run ads (usually community ads like promoting indie games, open for art illustration, or vtuber) while Western-made fediverse software are anti-ads.

Misskey also allows a lot of fun feature like social games, blogs, groups, emoji reaction, Misskey-flavored Markdown (people are getting wild with it).

It also have drive, which allow user to reuse existing uploaded image without using additional server storage.

Also, fun achievements!

[-] Eldritch@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Mastodon and miskey are interface's to the same open public protocol.

Bluesky is another, largely private, twitter like microblog. That can, but may never in a significant sense allow something close to what the fediverse does.

[-] supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz 2 points 3 days ago

Bluesky is a corporate hedge to delay the social network business from becoming not a business, it is headed by variously naive or disengenous tech people who believe they are creating the future when they are mercanaries for the past.

You know when you see oil company commercials and they have lots of footage of wind turbines, solar panels and other ecofriendly crap? That is bluesky.