European Central Bank Joins Bluesky, Elon Musk's Rival X

The President of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde, chose to use Bluesky (photo: x @Lagarde)

JAKARTA The European Central Bank (ECB) became active on the Bluesky micro-blogging platform on Monday, January 13, joining one of X's competitors, Elon Musk's platform. This was done just as the billionaire increased his political campaign activities in Europe.

Bluesky is one of several platforms that have tried to challenge X's dominance, formerly known as Twitter, since Musk bought it and used the platform to advance its political agenda. Recently, Musk urged German citizens to choose extreme right-wing parties.

An ECB spokesperson said the central bank was working "diversing its presence on social media" and had started using several new platforms since last year, making Bluesky the "new addition."

ECB started activities in Bluesky by sharing interviews with their chief economist, Philip Lane. The interview was also uploaded on X, which an ECB spokesperson said would still be used by the agency.

Musk, who helped Donald Trump win the United States presidential election last year, has been criticized by misinformation experts for allowing the spread of fake news during the campaign.

Last week, Musk hosted discussions with the leader of the extreme far-right party Alternative for Germany on X, a conversation the European Commission said would be overseen to monitor the potential spread of misinformation. Musk also gave his support to the right-handed Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni.

The ECB, under the leadership of President Christine Lagarde, has made gender equality and the fight against climate change an important part of its mission.

Musk, on the other hand, often criticizes the policies of diversity, equality, and inclusion. Even though he claims he "has done more for the environment than any other human on earth," Musk supports Trump who calls climate change a hoax.

As a cryptocurrency fan, Musk has also frequently criticized the Federal Reserve, calling the agency "having too many staff" and re-sharing a senator's post calling for the dissolution of the institution.

Several well-known organizations and figures, including the British news publisher The Guardian, have left X. Bluesky itself added 2.5 million users a week after Trump was elected, and experienced a spike in activity.

However, with only 27 million users, Bluesky is still much smaller than its competitors. Threads have about 252 million monthly active users in its mobile app, while X has around 317 million, according to Sensor Tower data.

European Union regulators last year stated that Bluesky violated EU rules for failing to disclose important details, such as the number of users in the region.