To: Uplift and similar organizations

End the hijacking of social media by the advertising industry!

This petition calls on Uplift and similar progressive organizations to lead the way by adding "share" buttons for all petitions for Bluesky, Mastodon, and any other platforms which emerge which are not based on advertising and black box algorithms.

Why is this important?

The internet initially brought hope of connecting people and sharing information. Social media and algorithms initially brought the ability to have content customized to your interests and connections, and discover new content and connections which interest you. This has been completely hijacked by the advertising industry.... The most commonly used social media platforms such as X/Facebook/Instagram/YouTube/Tiktok generate profit through the advertising industry and structure their algorithms around it. They lock users into their platforms because if you leave, you lose all your connections and "like"/"follow" settings.  The algorithms are black boxes which target ads at you to maximize profit of the platform. The organizations with the most ability to buy ads are corporations who want you to consume more and more (often in a way which destroys our planet), and industry special interests who fund political and policy campaigns in their own for-profit interests. People like Elon Musk can control world conversation by buying Twitter/X. There are alternative platforms such as Bluesky and Mastodon which are not modelled on the advertising industry and which support open algorithms and moderation rules, and which are not based on a lock-in model. However very few people are switching because they have already been locked-in to the advertising based lock-in platforms. Even progressive organizations like Uplift are supporting this model by putting "share" buttons only of these advertising social media platforms (X/Facebook) and not putting share buttons for Bluesky and Mastodon. This petition calls on Uplift and similar organizations to lead the way by adding share buttons for all petitions for Bluesky, Mastodon, and any other platforms which emerge which are not based on advertising and black box algorithms.