“My opinions on this come down to, ‘Yeah, I’d rather not see it’ or have it easily accessible,” says one Bluesky user who raised questions about why there had been a backlash to the ban and requested anonymity because they had already experienced the Rejection from other Bluesky users for expressing their opinion. “Tons of people in my life have struggled with sex and porn addiction, and being available behind a quick setting-toggle on/off switch really doesn’t help,” he says.
The anonymous user suggests that Bluesky could follow an approach taken by Reddit, which allows users to block access to all properly labeled “Not Safe for Work” (NSFW) subreddits. “Bluesky has their current ‘disable explicit content’ system, but you run into the problem of explicit tagging,” he says. Furthermore, he says that the current system labels some content as nudity when it isn’t, while something that is is missing.
For Sarah T. Roberts, faculty director at UCLA’s Center for Critical Internet Research, Bluesky’s challenges in tackling the nudity wave highlight the naivety around user behavior. “Once again, a platform hits the market and is shocked when users try to game and break things, and when they post nudity,” she says.
That lack of preparation for what Roberts thought would be inevitable could ruin Bluesky’s future growth. “Content moderation decisions as an afterthought, regardless of the level of permissiveness that is decided upon, are costly from both a financial and PR standpoint,” he says. “Surely it would not have taken a genius to predict this turn of events. So why is it once again a surprise and not an inevitability?
It is not known if the platform expected such user behavior. Jay Graber, CEO of Bluesky, sent an interview request to Bluesky’s anonymous press team, who declined to provide anyone for an interview, instead directing WIRED to your FAQ page. A member of Bluesky’s team posted that the decision to implement “no boobs (or dicks or asses) in what [sic] hot” was “a hard line to walk.” By default, Bluesky users will have the “Show Nudity” button turned on when they join, and “would prefer to keep it that way.” That means if people proactively follow a user who decides to share nudes, they’ll see it. “But what [sic] hot is a little different since you did not opt in, “they said Kicking.
Carolina Are calls the decision to remove lewd nudity from the What’s Hot page a form of shadowbanning, the subject of her investigation, as well as something she owns. experience with personally. “In fact, they have already limited the growth possibilities of anyone who shares nudity and sexuality,” she says. She worries that Bluesky is mixing penises, which are genitals, with breasts and asses, which are not necessarily sexual. “This is where things get really hard to govern,” she says.
Flea found sharing lewd nudity amazing because it showed that people, including trans people, felt safe, secure, and empowered on Bluesky. Still, she realizes why the focus had to change. “Not everyone wants to see lewd photos,” she says. “It’s not just about ‘being lewd’, I think it’s also about sharing your whole self with the world, and if that’s something people want, that option should be there.”
Are suggests that similarly, when users are asked if they want to find nudity from the users they follow, Bluesky could ask if users want to find nudity on What’s Hot when they join. “It’s quite interesting that they’re making that decision for everyone,” she says. “It’s okay for people who don’t consent to see nudity not to see it. But what about those who want to see it?
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