There's the profit motive. It's funded by venture capital, so it has to grow at all costs (check) and then cash out.
Twitter didn't start doing it (the pay-for-attention model) until 17 years after it was founded, so, I mean, bsky will probably be okay for a _while_.
Alternative reading: It took 17 years for venture capitalists to figure out the pay-for-attention model, at which point they immediately applied it to everything they could.
Nah, the pay-for-attention model (the bluetick thing) was Musk; other than dating/hookup sites (and even then, they usually _ration_ it) I think it’s the only significant social media site to do it. No VCs involved.
It’s not like it’s a new idea; dating sites have been trying it since the 90s. But it, ah, a _bad_ model; it is why any popular post on Twitter is now drowned in irrelevant replies from idiot blueticks. It’s a reasonable rule of thumb that, if you have to pay to have your posts amplified, they’re probably not good enough for anyone to want to read them.