Bluesky plans to introduce payments in the coming months, a first step in its strategy to make money without relying on advertising. CEO Toni Schneider and COO Rose Wang outlined the plans Thursday at TechCrunch Disrupt, explaining how the company hopes to build on the commerce and fundraising activity already happening on its decentralized social network.
"People are actually selling things, fundraising very successfully, supporting each other on the network," Schneider said. "We want to make that easier, and the way we're going to do this is if you see something on the network that you like and support, you can support that monetarily."
Schneider, the former CEO of Automattic, took the reins in March after longtime CEO Jay Graber stepped down. He acknowledged user anxiety over the leadership change but said the open nature of the platform keeps the team accountable: users can simply leave if they dislike a feature.
Wang pointed to Bluesky's status as a Public Benefit Corporation, which she said puts the company's mission at the center of its business strategy. "We cannot lock people in," she said, arguing that the people creating value on the network should be the ones capturing it. "First, we'll start with payments, but I think it's about disrupting the actual infrastructure layer."