Surprising no one, Meta has decided to close down their VR platform Horizon Worlds, after they invested $80 billion into it and encouraged five years of community building within it.
Communities, including AA meetings and a church that met there every Sunday, are rightfully devastated.
Former surgeon general Dr. Vivek Murthy, who declared loneliness as a public health crisis, now has a newsletter.
We’re excited to see what else this up and comer has to say about human connection and belonging 😁
This is the “cracker barrel effect”, where our collective memory is warped by fabricated online popularity. (Nearly half of the posts about the CB logo “controversy” were from bots)
Our friends at Trust Labs have spent over a decade studying how to build communities of care that not only withstand crises, but also grow sustainably.
Tomorrow, 4/15, they’ll be sharing insights from their latest report "Explorations in Relational Grit" at a virtual event @ 4pm EST:
“There is no need to ban social media. We just need it to be too expensive for the companies to keep doing business as usual.”
Author and entrepreneur @juliaangwin.com endorses a big tobacco-style movement of suing the pants off Big Tech to reform social media.
Divya Siddarth is curating the Collective Intelligence track at TED2026 this week. We've always appreciated Divya’s reframe on democracy and AI, and we’re excited to hear more from @jayb.bsky.social, @audreyt.org and others.
New_ Public's @deeptidoshi.bsky.social will be there -- DM her to connect!
Light blue background with white text box containing purple quote: "We're really excited to be working with the builders who are solving people's everyday problems. The value of this decentralized technology should not be just an abstract aspiration, but something that people can feel the benefit of in their everyday lives. This is a concrete way to really build momentum against the extractive, surveillance-based platforms and products used by most consumers today." Attribution reads "Deepti Doshi, Co-Director, New_ Public"
We’ve created the Open Social Awards to support and celebrate prosocial builders around the world who are creating useful, helpful, and fun tech products on the open web. 🌱
Thursday 4/16, hear directly from game-changing youth who are designing solutions to some of today’s most urgent digital challenges.
Builders aged 14 - 23 will present their projects as part of ReThink Citizens’s Youth Coalition Showcase 🚀
luma.com/2evlo3zw
Light purple background with brown text on left reading "ROUNDABOUT is a way to bring your town or neighborhood or town together online without the noise or toxicity of big social media platforms." Right side shows mobile interface for "ROUNDABOUT SILVERDALE" with category icons, "Good Afternoon!" greeting, community update post from Arden Hayes (Steward), and photo of birds flying over water labeled "Photo of the Week shared by Jane D." Bottom navigation shows Home, Feed, Calendar, and Guides tabs.
We’re building Roundabout, our local community app, to be as useful as possible, for as many people as possible.
But, notably, we’re not here to make a billion dollars.
We’re a nonprofit, funded by philanthropy, trying to build Roundabout into a sustainable, resilient org for the long haul.
🧵
👍👍 One of the orgs that defines standards for the internet just gave a BIG thumbs up to AT Protocol, the tech that powers Bluesky.
This could be huge for scaling open and independent social apps and websites!
More from @dholms.at, head of protocol at Bluesky:
Relational tech is centered around thoughtfully crafted tools that help neighbors care, collaborate, and build trust.
Relational Tech Project created an awesome experimental workspace where neighbors can build digital tools to fit their unique community needs.
studio.relationaltechproject.org
Occasionally we get requests that might be a great opportunity for someone in our larger community. Let’s see if we can make a connection! Aaron Bear Berger offers: I’m building a map-based platform that makes local music scenes visible, accessible, and financially supportive. Instead of relying on algorithms like Spotify and social media, it lets people explore real artists in their area based on what’s happening now with new releases and upcoming shows. Each artist has a simple profile where fans can listen to a track and directly support them, creating a more intentional, community-driven way to discover and sustain local music. I’m primarily looking for collaborators right now and pressure testers, especially folks who understand building community around local culture/arts. Funding might come later, but right now I’m focused on finding partners to build this out with. Honestly, creative brainstorming / ideation could be fruitful. Want to get in touch with Aaron? Use our contact form and put “For A.B.B.” at the start of your message. We’ll pass along your messages. Or, if you have a request to share in the next Bulletin Board, also please send that along.
📢 Call for creative community builders who want to support local bands and musicians!
Use our contact form and put “For A.B.B.” at the start of the message to get in touch: newpublic.org/contact
Check out this impressive “database of independent journalism creators across platforms, topics and geographies” from The Independent Journalism Atlas!
It’s cool to see journalists building their own discovery tools on their own terms, outside of Big Tech platforms.
journalismatlas.com
Communities are not interchangeable or disposable. Break a network and some of those relationships, all that institutional knowledge, are gone forever.
@joanwestenberg.com writes eloquently on communities and digital displacement, and how Big Tech is addicted to this cycle of social destruction.
Diagram showing four-stage process with green arrow shapes labeled "PLAN," "SOURCE," "CURATE," and "RANK" with plant growth icons. Below each stage are gray boxes with details: (A) User quote requesting pet content feed, (B) Sources including accounts followed, custom feeds, hashtags, and search terms, (C) Content curation rules showing "Always show," "Sometimes show," "Show less often," and "Never show" categories, (D) Ranking algorithm showing 40% Relevancy, 25% Recency, 35% Popularity. Right side displays mobile feed mockup titled "Your Feed" with three posts from pet accounts showing engagement metrics.
Feedbuilders like @graze.social and @attie.ai are meant for customizing Bluesky feeds. In recent research on something similar, participants were able to focus on their interests, discover relevant content, and engage with social media more intentionally.
arxiv.org/abs/2509.10776
Beige background with header "POLLING RESULTS | MARCH 2026" and methodology note about 1004 likely voters. Main headline reads "Americans chose human control over speed by 8 to 1." Visual shows 10 person icons: 8 green, 1 purple, 1 gray, representing 80% favor humans in charge with strong oversight and limits, 10% favor fast and lightly regulated approach, 10% not sure. Three statistics displayed: 73% want children protected from manipulative AI, 72% believe AI companies should be legally responsible for harms, 69% want superintelligence prohibited until proven safe. "View polling results →" link at bottom.
The people have spoken – they’re not interested in letting AI companies “move fast and break things” 😤
humanstatement.org
Black background with title "Comments are Broken" (Comments highlighted in blue). Text in blue and white reads: "Created for engagement and not impact / Continued online toxicity and lack of facilitation. / We're losing control over how we engage our own audience / Inherited bad UX from social media. / As publishers - we have a role to play"
Black background with italicized text "Real world learnings" at top. Left side shows white text "Learn from what works in the real world." Right side displays Matrix movie still of Morpheus wearing sunglasses with white text "WELCOME" and "TO THE REAL WORLD."
Black background with italicized text "Impact vs engagement" at top. Left side shows white text "Create what helps people learn, exposed to different perspectives, get more informed and smarter!" Right side displays cartoon of two people at a table with thought bubble reading "BUFFERING... BUFFERING... BUFFERING..."
Black background with italicized text "New UX patterns that work for you" at top. Left side shows white text "Don't inherit bad ui/ux from social media." Right side displays simplified interface mockup showing user icon, chat bubbles, prohibition symbol, and engagement icons (heart, thumbs up) with orange notification badges.
Gitesh Gohel, Chief Product Officer at The Atlantic, explains why the comments section is failing both news orgs and their audiences – and he suggests nine ways that media orgs can reinvigorate meaningful discussion among readers.
We’ll share some of our favorites below!
youtu.be/Guu-pv6jPR4?...
Social media researcher @jonathanstray.bsky.social shares promising results from the Prosocial Ranking Challenge!
After testing five algorithms, two approaches showed statistically significant depolarization effects.
This feels like a watershed moment.
Juries are starting to find that a “free speech” defense can’t shield social media companies from their liability for building addictive platforms with features like infinite scroll, auto-play and reinforcing algorithms.
It’s a perfect time for alternatives:
Let’s go!! Excited to share the first ever Open Social Awards.
We really need alternatives to Big Tech social media platforms that are useful, helpful, and wildly popular.
Applications are due May 1!
📢 Announcing the Open Social Awards ✨
Alongside PublicSpaces and Waag Futurelab, we aim to honor the work of independent builders around the world, creating innovative products for the open web!
More details below…
newpublic.org/OSA
“The next time you use an AI system, ask one question: Is this working for me, or am I working for it? That instinct ... is where sovereignty starts.”
Our friends at @projectliberty.io launched their newsletter, and we’re loving this first post on how we can maintain agency when using AI tools:
A healthier internet isn’t just wishful thinking — our friends at the @prosocialdesign.bsky.social have a whole library of research-backed design solutions for building prosocial spaces online, organized by our Civic Signals research!
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Why is @knightfoundation.org investing in Bluesky?
“If we care about the First Amendment in practice, we must also care about the architecture that shapes and facilitates speech in our own era.
That’s why we believe ATproto was worth investing in.”
FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! 🔥🥵🌶️
Okay, now that we’ve got the algorithm’s (& hopefully your) attention: Our latest Bulletin Board newsletter has great internet finds like upcoming prosocial tech events, new research, & ways to connect!
(Sorry if we scared you 😅 but the internet is probably on fire somewhere)
The audience for Roundabout, then, is not only end users, but a potential ecosystem of tool-builders embedded within communities themselves. These folks might not think of themselves as developers, but the neighbor who organizes a block party knows more about their own needs than any number of teams at Silicon Valley tech startups. Given the right tools and agency, we’re sure the things they’ll build will be remarkable.
Big tech doesn’t know what tech tools your neighbors need — but your neighbors do.
Thanks to changing forces and capacities in tech, communities might have the power to finally build what they need for themselves. And we want to be part of that shift in power 👏
Excited to be in Vancouver next week for @atmosphereconf.org with the @newpublic.org team!
“The real value is not in the single piece of content but in you getting addicted to the algorithm.”
A fascinating (and a little unsettling) feature-by-feature breakdown from Enrico Tartarotti on how short-form video content is meticulously designed to control your attention.
Have a request for our community of 16k+ newsletter readers? We’d love to share it!
Whether you’re looking for collaborators or amplifying an event, we’re gathering community asks and announcements on our “bulletin board” newsletter every month.
Share in the comments or on our contact form below:
Three-panel image showing a conference room with four people in business attire seated at a table facing a presenter in a blue suit standing near a projection screen displaying a simple, easy to understand social media interface. Top panel shows subtitle "So it's very important, it needs to be nice at first." Middle panel shows presenter gesturing with subtitle "But then..." Bottom panel shows the social media interface has changed to be crowded with ads and pop-up windows while the group high-fives each other.
A day in the life of an enshittificator … Norwegian Consumer Council really nailed it 👏😂
www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4Up...