DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2412.05624
Note: Also Posted on Zenodo
Abstract
This study examines the shift in the scientific community from X (formerly Twitter) to Bluesky, its impact on scientific communication, and consequently on social metrics (altmetrics). Analyzing 10,174 publications from multidisciplinary and library and information science (LIS) journals in 2024, the results reveal a notable increase in Bluesky activity for multidisciplinary journals in November 2024, likely influenced by political and platform changes, with mentions doubling or quadrupling for journals like Nature and Science. In LIS, the adoption of Bluesky is more limited and shows significant variations across journals, suggesting discipline-specific adoption patterns. However, overall engagement on Bluesky remains significantly lower than on X. While X currently dominates altmetric mentions, the observed growth on Bluesky suggests a potential shift in the future, underscoring its emerging role in academic dissemination and the challenges of adapting scholarly communication metrics across evolving platforms.
Figure 1. Evolution of Bluesky mentions of scientific publications from four major altmetrics journals between December 2023 and November 2024 Source: 10.48550/arXiv.2412.05624
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area.
He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit.
Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.
