this post was submitted on 27 Mar 2025
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There is a legitimate reason for this: it’s the only way to provide content creators with evidence of how many people actually clicked on the link.
The downside is that there is so many ways that a feature like this can be abused by BlueSky in ways that can hurt users.
No, it's not the only way. You could track the click with JavaScript.
The user can also block your tracking scripts. Besides, the user can share the link with friends, and you won't be able to track them this way. I'm sure there are many other reasons why having a middleware is de-facto the industry standard.
The user can also block the URL target rewriting. Not sure what's your point though, I said it's not the only way, not that there are better ways.
Why do content creators need to see how many clicks they get?
It's how a number of them get paid.
I think I would like to go back to social media before people were getting paid for it
Thats the fediverse!
I would like to go back to the 90s and 00s where the internet wasn't being monetised at every fucking opportunity.
I don't know. I'm happy that some very talented and knowledgeable people create content that makes my life a little better, and that they are able to do that thanks to the various forms of monetization.
Yeah, it's literally the second step of enshittification, where platforms stop allocating value to users and start allocating them to publishers. This is still Bluesky expanding out its surveillance apparatus, something it will have every incentive to abuse later on like other platforms before it.
There is no way it isn't already being abused, there are zero guard rails on it
Fucking typical, a move that hurts the platform long-term is being cheered for by ignorant idealists while the makers of its demise are already salivating and cartoonishly rubbing their hands in glee
The content creators themselves could use a link that goes through a counter if they really need it, no?
lol. Citations needed. Pretty sure this is JavaScript 101.
That's incorrect.
BlueSky relies on JavaScript to run (try turning it off and loading their site, it won't even render). Click-through traffic is almost exclusively measured by JavaScript (e.g. Google ad "events"). This is the same as measuring other stats, like whether you lingered on a post before scrolling past it, or whether you opened another tab, or whatever.
Proxy links are absolutely a method of measuring traffic, and they're a method that works even when the site has JavaScript disabled - but since that's not how Bsky works, it's not relevant.
Yeah that's what I was thinking. There's a bunch of ways to track what users are doing without needing to use referral links.
Seems to me the referral links are there to prevent honey cookie shenanigans.
Trust me bro, we are not tracking you. Please trust me bro!
If the purpose of this feature was tracking, they could just use a JavaScript onclick handler.