There’s a brand new Bluesky app within the works from a well-liked developer of iOS functions. Tapbots, the corporate behind the favored Mastodon consumer Ivory, born out of its earlier efforts with Tweetbot (RIP), is readying a brand new app known as Phoenix, designed for Bluesky’s rising social community of over 32 million customers.
In a publish on Bluesky, the corporate shared its web site teasing the brand new app, which is anticipated to launch someday later this summer time.
On its website, Tapbots clarified that its work on a Bluesky consumer doesn’t imply it’s abandoning its efforts within the fediverse, also referred to as the open social internet. Nevertheless, Ivory’s improvement will briefly sluggish as the brand new efforts are underway.
Ivory, which launched in 2023, introduced again Tweetbot’s appear and feel and a number of other of its options to supply a substitute for Mastodon’s official social app, an open supply, decentralized various to bigger platforms like X. As a federated app, Ivory is built-in with ActivityPub, the protocol powering a bunch of federated social apps together with not solely Mastodon, but additionally PeerTube, Pixelfed, Meta’s Threads, Flipboard, and others.
Bluesky, in the meantime, is constructed on a special protocol, the AT Protocol (or atproto for brief).
Since Twitter’s acquisition by Elon Musk and its transformation into X, many former Twitter customers have moved on to different networks, together with Mastodon and Bluesky. For an indie operation like Tapbots, that meant its buyer base was break up between two providers, making it tougher to generate income with only one app.
“… For us to proceed to thrive as an organization, we should help each,” Tapbots shared on its web site. “Sadly, we are able to’t survive on Mastodon alone.”
The corporate additionally explains that it determined to launch a devoted app for Bluesky customers as a substitute of mixing the 2 networks into one app as a result of this might provide customers a greater expertise. Those that wish to preserve a presence on each social networks will be capable to reap the benefits of a deliberate cross-posting function, it added.
Sadly for Mastodon customers, work on Ivory might want to sluggish because the group works to launch Phoenix.
“It will be a lie if we stated Ivory can be in full improvement whereas we are attempting to get Phoenix up and working,” the web site explains. “Nevertheless, we didn’t wish to begin Phoenix improvement till after we launched Ivory v2.3. As soon as Phoenix is out the door, improvement will occur concurrently and each apps will get all the massive enhancements we now have deliberate all through the apps.”
Information of Phoenix’s launch was first reported by MacStories.
Although the corporate has not introduced Phoenix’s monetization technique, it would doubtless be a subscription mannequin just like Ivory’s — a free app with in-app purchases for entry to premium options. At the moment, Ivory is $1.99 per thirty days or $14.99 per yr.
Phoenix will enter a restricted public alpha section forward of its summer time 2025 launch.
