Bluesky is getting its own photo-sharing app, Flashes
More good news for those looking to exit the Meta social app ecosystem in favor of a more open alternative: an independent developer is building a photo-sharing app for Bluesky called Flashes. The soon-to-be-launched app is powered by the same technology that powers Bluesky, i.e. the AT protocol, and has been built using code from the developer’s previous Bluesky client, Skeets.
When launched, Flashes could capitalize on growing consumer demand for alternatives to Big Tech’s social media monopoly. This trend has led to the adoption of open source decentralized applications such as Mastodon and Bluesky, among others. Including the recently launched Pixelfed mobile appsbuilt on Mastodon’s ActivityPub protocol. It’s also, in part, what’s fueling the conversion of TikTok users to Chinese app RedNote before the US TikTok ban – That is, US users are indicating that they would rather use a foreign discount app than return to Meta at this point.
The Flashes app itself is based on Berlin developer Sebastian Vogelsang’s previous app, Skeets, and is his first venture into creating consumer-facing apps for the growing social media network, Bluesky, which is now at the top 27.5 million users.
While Bluesky offers its own official mobile client, Skeets has differentiated itself by focusing on the needs of iPad users as well as tailored accessibility features for blind and visually impaired users, as this is one of Vogelsang’s areas of expertise.
Late last year, Vogelsang also realized there was potential to create apps using the same code base that would meet the needs of Bluesky users who are more interested in visual content, such as photos and videos. Since Bluesky already supports this type of media, it was just a matter of reconfiguring the Skeets app so that its design and UI looked more similar to other photo-sharing apps, like Meta’s Instagram.
“I thought about the idea of having one basic social graph and then different apps choosing just from that graph what they want to display,” Vogelsang told TechCrunch. “I found it very interesting, because before that we had these separate networks.”
Flashes could help attract new potential Bluesky users who haven’t yet joined the social network because they don’t consider themselves a “Twitter person,” he says.
“This could give them an entry point into the network, into the entire protocol,” Vogelsang said.
However, the developer stresses that Flashes is not intended to be a clone of Instagram, and will not offer the same features.
At launch, Flashes will support photo posts of up to four photos and videos up to one minute long, just like Bluesky. Users who post on Flashes will also have their posts appear on Bluesky and comments on those posts will also be returned to the app as if it were just another Bluesky client. It will also support Bluesky direct messaging.
To make this work, Flashes simply filters Bluesky’s current timeline for posts that contain photos and video posts. (In the future, Vogelsang also plans to add metadata to Flashes posts so that Bluesky users have a way to keep their feeds on the main Bluesky app from being flooded with photo posts if that becomes an issue.)
It didn’t take long to build Flash because it was able to reuse Skeets’ existing code. The app will also be able to market to Skeets’ existing user base, who have now downloaded the app around 30,500 times to date.
Vogelsang says it’s now integrating subscription-based features from both apps so users don’t have to pay twice for premium features, like bookmarks, drafts, muting, rich push notifications, and other Flashes-specific features. (Both apps are free to use without a subscription, which should be noted.)
Later, Vogelsang said he wanted to launch a video-only app called Blue Screen.
The developer expects to be able to release Flashes to the public within weeks with the TestFlight beta arriving before then. Interested users can follow along Flash account on Bluesky For more updates.
