5 private links
Bluesky's faux-open AT protocol is kinda like ActivityPub, but people host their own posts thus making content creators pay for their own content but the distribution of the content would be done by huge centralized entities - probably only Bluesky.
Maybe people will make great third-party apps for Bluesky which further saves Bluesky PBLLC some more money. The implementation of the content servers can be open source too.
Don't pay for the code. Don't pay for the content, but inject ads indistinguishable from the content into the feed, because you control the means of distribution. This is a plan that would sound brilliant to any venture capitalist.
I honestly didn't expect this to be anything but a scam since the day Jack Dorsey announced this as a reaction to ActivityPub. Embrace, Extend and Extinguish in action.