Bluesky Experiences Temporary Outage: A Case for Decentralization?

In the early hours of Friday, Bluesky faced significant accessibility issues, rendering large portions of the platform offline for approximately one hour. Interestingly, some users reported no disruption, highlighting the advantages of decentralization.

During this outage, many individuals on alternative microblogging platforms seized the opportunity to criticize the centralization of what is marketed as a decentralized network. Bluesky has since announced that a probable cause for the outage has been identified, with plans for an update to rectify the situation.

The Chief Technology Officer of Bluesky has promised further details regarding the incident. However, Paul Frazee noted that not all users were affected; those who host their accounts independently remained online, albeit with limited content on their timelines.

Bluesky operates on technology initially designed for Twitter, but the connections to the original platform have been severed. Since Donald Trump's election victory in November, Bluesky has seen a surge in user growth, although criticism of its decentralization claims has persisted. The platform currently hosts nearly all of its over 35 million accounts on its own servers, raising questions about its true decentralization.

The recent outage has underscored the need for a genuine shift towards decentralization within the platform. During an early-access initiative, users were provided the option to host their accounts and data on their own Personal Data Servers (PDS). Though this comes with certain limitations, such as a cap of ten accounts per server, the outage demonstrated an advantage for those self-hosting, as they were unaffected by the downtime. Nonetheless, the fact that the majority of users could not access the network during the outage limits the overall benefit of this feature.

Meanwhile, the reaction on platforms like Mastodon was notably critical. Unlike Bluesky, Mastodon has established a more robust decentralized infrastructure, with over eight million accounts distributed across more than 9,500 servers. This means that even if several servers experience outages, many remain operational. However, a previous analysis highlighted that a significant number of Mastodon instances are hosted by a single French provider, OVH, and a considerable portion of accounts reside on a server operated by the German company Hetzner.

As the digital landscape continues to evolve, the challenges faced by Bluesky may prompt a reevaluation of its operational structure and the validity of its decentralization claims. The focus will likely shift towards fostering a more resilient and genuinely decentralized network to better serve its users.