With growing success, short messaging service Bluesky is coming under the radar of the EU Commission. According to the Digital Services Act (DSA), platforms like Bluesky are subject to certain disclosure obligations, which, according to the EU Commission, the provider has not yet complied with. The Commission itself does not want to get involved yet and is sending forward DSA coordinators from the Member States.
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According to the DSA, foreign platforms in the EU are also obliged to provide information about operator and user numbers and to have a contact person in the EU. “Even the smallest platforms must have a dedicated page on their website that provides information about the number of users in the EU and the company’s legal headquarters,” a Commission spokesman in Brussels said on Monday. ” This is “not really the case” with Bluesky.
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“It is not up to the Commission to enforce DSA rules here. That is a matter for national DSA coordinators,” a Commission spokesperson said. “Aware of this issue, the Commission has asked DSA coordinators to investigate at the national level whether there are any leads on Bluesky.” In Germany it is the Federal Network Agency.
At just over 20 million, the number of Bluesky users is still well below the threshold at which DSA rules apply, especially to larger platforms. With more than 45 million users in the EU, a service is considered a “very large online platform” (VLOP) – and then it is subject to strict regulation. Because Bluesky has not yet crossed this threshold despite a significant increase in user numbers following the US election, the Commission’s hands are initially tied.
Bluesky was founded in 2019 and has its roots in a project for a new decentralized social network started by then-Twitter boss Jack Dorsey. The original Twitter project was spun off as a separate company in late 2021. Bluesky is registered as a non-profit corporation in Seattle, Washington state. How exactly the company is financed is not entirely clear.
non-profit company
Dorsey, who provided initial financing as Twitter’s CEO, was a shareholder and represented on the board, but has since stepped down from Bluesky. According to media reports, CEO Jay Graber owns most of the company’s shares. Officially the company belongs to Graber “and the Bluesky Team”. Bluesky’s stated goal is to create a “social application” that is “not controlled by any one company.” The platform is open to all users from early 2024.
So far, companies such as Google (Play Store, Maps, YouTube), Meta (Facebook, Instagram), Microsoft (Linkedin), booking and trading platforms like Amazon or Temu, as well as porn portals have been classified as VLOPs by the EU. Has gone. , Wikipedia is also on the list. Some companies – Amazon, Pornhub and Zalando – are taking legal action to defend themselves against the classification and DSA requirements. The proceedings are still going on.
See also: Heize online on BlueSky
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