Bluesky Attie Quests turns its AI feed builder into a research tool

Bluesky Attie Quests is the social network’s latest attempt to turn its AI assistant into something more useful than a feed-building shortcut. For investors tracking the next phase of social media, the update shows Bluesky testing paid-product potential as its user growth cools.

Bluesky said this week that Attie, its AI assistant for creating custom social feeds without writing code, now has a feature called Quests. The tool lets users ask open-ended questions about news, trends and discussions across what Bluesky calls the Atmosphere, meaning Bluesky and other apps built on the AT Protocol.

The AT Protocol is the open networking system behind Bluesky. In plain English, it is the technical layer that lets different social apps plug into the same broader network instead of keeping every post, account and conversation inside one company’s closed platform.

What is Bluesky Attie Quests?

Quests expands Attie from a feed-customization assistant into a research tool for the open social web. Bluesky said users can ask it to surface information about trending topics or find influential accounts in a specific field or location.

That matters because Bluesky is trying to build products around its network, not just add more users. Attie launched in March as a separate Bluesky product that helps people design their own algorithms and build custom feeds. Bluesky has said Attie is free for now, while also considering whether to charge for it later.

Bluesky’s growth has moderated after a fast expansion last year. The network doubled to 40 million users last October within a year, according to TechCrunch’s earlier reporting. A public Bluesky statistics tracker, bsky.jazco.dev, now shows about 45.6 million registered accounts.

How Bluesky is positioning AI

Jay Graber, Bluesky’s chief innovation officer and former CEO, framed Attie as a way to help users cut through misinformation and noisy online conversations. In a company post, Graber wrote that Attie is meant to help people “make sense of the internet” and give them tools to find information for themselves.

Graber also wrote that Bluesky wants Attie to lower the skill needed to use the AT Protocol and make social customization available to more users. She said Attie is being redesigned with accessibility updates and a new logo, with additional changes planned over the coming months.

The new Attie experience is currently in beta. Bluesky said users will be admitted from a waitlist during the next several weeks.

Why monetization is part of the story

Bluesky’s AI push comes with a community challenge. TechCrunch reported that many Bluesky users are skeptical of AI for economic, political and environmental reasons. At the same time, Bluesky needs revenue to support its own business and the AT Protocol development it leads.

The company has more room to test ideas after raising $100 million in funding. Bluesky announced that round in March and said it had closed in 2025. TechCrunch reported that the funding gives Bluesky runway to experiment with products such as Attie, a possible premium subscription and tools aimed at power users.

For retail investors watching private tech companies, Attie is a useful signal. Bluesky is still smaller than the dominant social platforms, but it is trying to turn an open social network into a set of services people may eventually pay for.

This story draws on original reporting from TechCrunch.