To understand all this better, consider that the Crypto PAC 'Fairshake' spend over $20M in Illinois and $10M of that on a failed attempt to defeat Julianna Stratton. They have over $220M more to spend on influencing the midterms. For these guys the opportunity to achieve some degree of message control over liberal social media is well worth $100M.

How will they do it? Algorithmic manipulation of social media? Quieting critics, amplifying favorable messaging? Has it already begun?

@JonChevreau

Bluesky's 2025 $100M Series B Lays Foundation for Open Social Web - Bluesky

In April 2025, Bluesky raised $100 million in Series B funding led by Bain Capital Crypto. Since our Series A, we've grown from 13 million to over 43 million global users.

Bluesky (bsky.social)

@mastodonmigration
Who could have possibly predicted?

@mastodonmigration
Yeah!!! Why!!!??

@mastodonmigration Ah, Bain. The stories we could tell.

Anyway, just need Mike Masnick to tell us why this is good actually.

@TheGreatLlama

Funny you should ask. Have literally dozens of posts around this topic. Here is the first one back just after the 2024 election.

Mastodon Migration (@mastodonmigration@mastodon.online)

FICTIONAL DATELINE November 2027: Elon Musk Completes Acquisition of Bluesky LLC Musk announced his intention to fold the upstart liberal social media network into his X Empire, shocking Democrats and the progressive social media community that moved en masse to Bluesky three years ago after the disastrous 2024 election. "No one could have seen this coming," agreed top content creators on Bluesky assuring their millions of followers, they would stay and fight to keep Bluesky blue. #Bluesky

Mastodon (mastodon.online)

But, it would make sense for them to spring the trap this year since the midterms are really critical to the future of democracy in the US.

@tehstu

Well maybe you will have better luck...

Mastodon Migration (@mastodonmigration@mastodon.online)

Who owns Bluesky? Let's ask Mike Masnick @mmasnick@mastodon.social who is on the board of Bluesky PBC. Mike is a famous long time journalism critic and founder of Techdirt. He regularly writes about how Bluesky is decentralized and how you can 'move your digital identity' around the Bluesky network. Mike is a big advocate of open systems, so let's ask him to open up about who owns the company that he promotes so enthusiastically. Mike, who really owns Bluesky? #Bluesky #WhoOwnsBluesky

Mastodon (mastodon.online)

@mastodonmigration
I mean... I'm pretty sure everyone who moved here and DIDN'T go over to Bluesky saw something like this coming. I remember chuckling about the false exclusivity of the invites. Gotta jerk the lure a bit to get the fish to bite.

@mastodonmigration I left BS (haha) for here full time about a month ago. After some entiled chud told me I was invalid because my "Theory of Victory ️" didn't align with his, I decided that probably wasn't the place for me. Super enjoying this spot though, it actually feels how the web used to in the late 90's. I've missed it...

@mastodonmigration So they are sitting on $100M since almost a year and did more or less nothing with it to grow their business? OK, I guess ...

@mastodonmigration as transparent as vantablack...

@TheGreatLlama @mastodonmigration I went there first, found out how horrible it is and sacked it off. It felt like it was just a differently flavoured echo chamber.

@jwildeboer yeah, raises some eyebrows especially since they've been in decline... wonder what they've been keeping the warchest for and if they'll start spending now with new leadership...

@mastodonmigration

@Zebadiah_Carter

I'm glad you're enjoying it here. There's a refreshing anti oligarchy & pro alt text vibe in the Fediverse.

@mastodonmigration

@mastodonmigration

Kinda puts the CEO stepping down last week in a new light...

@srfirehorseart @mastodonmigration Thanks! The vibes have been overwhelmingly positive so far. I'm almost enjoying being online again

@mastodonmigration ID of the VC owners? You’ve been asking the question for a long time so I’m sure you’re gratified to have the answer

@lawyersgunsnmoney

It is just infuriating that such an underhanded and pretty transparent strategy should work so well. And it is not over by a long shot.

@mastodonmigration Thanks: odd I didn’t,t learn of this via its own site!

@srfirehorseart @Zebadiah_Carter @mastodonmigration Been on Mastodon since Nov 2022, when Musk bought Twitter/X. Joined BS too after Kamala lost but still prefer Mastodon: it’s usually my first point of call. I think of this place being about quality rather than quantity.