I've been thinking about the difference between Jottings and Bluesky lately. They're both interesting platforms, but they solve fundamentally different problems. Both exist in my toolkit, but for very different reasons.
Let me be clear upfront: I'm not anti-Bluesky. I think it's doing something genuinely important—building a decentralized social network with the AT Protocol. That's meaningful work. But Bluesky and Jottings aren't really competitors. They're tools for different purposes, and understanding that distinction matters.
What Bluesky Does Really Well
Bluesky is a social network. Its job is to connect you with other people, spark conversation, and create what I'll call "discovery dynamics." When you post on Bluesky, you're entering a commons. Your post might reach strangers. Someone might reply with a brilliant insight you didn't expect. You might find a new community around a shared interest.
That's genuinely valuable.
The decentralization aspect is elegant too. You're not locked into a single company's infrastructure. You can switch clients, export your data, even run your own server if you want. The AT Protocol makes that possible. For people concerned about corporate control of social networks—and rightfully so—Bluesky offers a real alternative.
Bluesky also has what I'll call "social velocity." Likes, reposts, replies, algorithmic feeds—these create momentum. Your post can go viral. You can build an audience. There's a feedback loop that's psychologically powerful and, frankly, sometimes addictive.
What Jottings Does Differently
Jottings starts from a different premise: what if you just wanted to write on the internet without any of that?
With Jottings, you get a personal microblog. You own the domain. You control the content. There's no algorithm. No followers. No likes. No reposts. No one else's content in your feed.
When someone visits your Jottings site, they see what you decided to publish, in the order you published it. That's it. No algorithmic reordering. No suggested content. No engagement metrics trying to game your psychology.
This sounds like a limitation, but it's actually liberating. You write because you have something to say, not because you're chasing engagement. You're building something permanent—your own corner of the internet that's genuinely yours.
The Real Difference
Here's what I think the real distinction is:
Bluesky is for when you want to be part of a conversation. You post something, people reply, you engage in public discourse. It's social. It's dynamic. It's about connection.
Jottings is for when you want to have a voice. You publish your thoughts on your own terms, in your own space. You're not trying to go viral. You're not optimizing for engagement. You're just saying things that matter to you.
Both are valid. I think most people probably want both sometimes.
The person who wants to discuss the latest design trends with their community? Bluesky. The person who wants to share their long-form thoughts on their own website? Jottings. The person who wants to both? That's fine too. They're not mutually exclusive.
Why I Built Jottings
I built Jottings because I noticed something: the cost of "free" social platforms is your attention and your data. Every feature is optimized to keep you scrolling. Every metric is designed to make you feel good when your engagement is high and bad when it's low.
I wanted something different. A platform where the default behavior is healthy. Where you're not tempted by engagement metrics. Where you own your content completely.
Jottings does three things really well:
It's simple. Create posts. They go on your site. That's the entire feature set. No algorithm. No feeds. No discovery engine.
You own it. Your content is on your domain. You control the whole thing. No platform can change its terms of service and suddenly affect you.
It's cheap and reliable. Because Jottings generates static HTML, it's incredibly fast and can be served globally for pennies. No scaling problems. No downtime.
The trade-off? You don't get the network effects of a social platform. Your posts won't reach strangers unless you actively promote them. You're not part of a real-time conversation happening on Jottings because there is no happening—it's just individual websites.
The Complementary Vision
What I think is interesting is using both.
Post on Bluesky for conversation. Share your daily thoughts, engage with your community, participate in the zeitgeist. That has real value.
Maintain a Jottings site for substance. Write the longer pieces. Archive your best thinking. Build a permanent home for your ideas that isn't subject to someone else's business model.
Many of my favorite internet creators do something similar—they're on social networks AND they have a personal website. The social network is great for discovery and engagement. The personal website is where the real work lives.
The Philosophy
At the heart of it, Jottings is built on a specific philosophy: the internet is better when more people own their own platforms.
That doesn't mean social networks are bad. They're not. They serve a purpose. But I think it's healthy for there to be alternatives—places where you can exist on the internet without depending on anyone else's infrastructure, algorithms, or business model.
Bluesky is doing something similar with decentralization. I respect that immensely. But decentralization of the infrastructure isn't quite the same as owning your own platform. Even on Bluesky, you're still part of a network. There's still a protocol. There are still rules.
Jottings is more extreme: it's just your website. Your rules. Your content. Complete autonomy.
Final Thought
I think the internet will be more interesting when there's a healthy ecosystem of tools serving different purposes. Some people want engagement and community. Some people want autonomy and ownership. Most of us want both at different times.
If you've been on social networks and felt trapped by the engagement game, Jottings might be exactly what you're looking for. And if you love the conversation and discovery that comes with platforms like Bluesky, that's great too. They're not competing for the same niche.
They're just different tools for different purposes.