X's Starterpacks: A Cautionary Tale in Centralized Discovery

X's new Starterpacks feature, announced by head of product Nikita Bier on 21 January, offers pre-curated lists of accounts to follow across categories from Politics to Memes. The twist: unlike Bluesky's version—which lets any user create and share starter packs and helped drive the platform's growth surge through 2024—X's implementation is entirely company-controlled. The decision reveals more than a product roadmap: it exposes how major platforms approach the cold start problem by copying the feature, stripping out community empowerment, and maintaining editorial control.

What X is actually building

According to Bier's announcement, X spent several months analysing platform data to identify what the company calls 'top-performing posters' across categories including News, Technology, Business & Finance, Health & Fitness, and Gaming. The starter packs will also include region-specific selections, though X hasn't disclosed the methodology for determining what qualifies as 'top-performing' or whether the metrics favour verified accounts, subscriber counts, engagement rates, or revenue generation through X's creator programme.

The feature is slated to roll out to all users 'in the coming weeks', with possible early access arriving sooner. Standard issue tech company timing—vague enough to avoid accountability if deployment drags.

What X isn't building is the participatory element. Bluesky's implementation, launched mid-2024, allows any user to create a starter pack, cap it at a manageable size, and share it across the network. The feature went viral precisely because it enabled community-led discovery: journalists creating lists of reporters covering specific beats, academics compiling researchers in niche fields, and crucially for dating industry purposes, sex educators and relationship coaches curating voices that algorithms routinely suppress.

Why editorial control matters for dating voices

The distinction between user curation and company curation isn't academic for dating industry operators who rely on social platforms for content distribution, community building, and subscriber acquisition. X's algorithmic and policy decisions have consistently marginalised sex-positive content, relationship advice that discusses intimacy, and dating safety education—often categorising it alongside explicit material despite its educational intent.

User-curated starter packs offered a workaround. A dating safety advocate could compile a list of trust & safety professionals, therapists discussing healthy relationships, and researchers studying online dating behaviour, then share it directly. Followers discover accounts through trusted community members rather than algorithmic recommendation, which often defaults to the most engagement-optimised (read: controversial or clickbait) content.

X's company-curated approach centralises that gatekeeping. The platform will determine which accounts represent 'Health & Fitness' or warrant inclusion in any category touching relationships, sexuality, or dating. Given X's track record since Elon Musk's acquisition—including advertiser exodus, content moderation rollbacks, and prioritisation of paid verification in feeds—there's limited reason to believe marginalised voices will feature prominently in official starter packs.

Dating company social teams and industry thought leaders who've built audiences by serving specific communities now face another platform feature designed without their use cases in mind.

The competitive context nobody's mentioning

X isn't alone in adopting starter pack functionality, which somewhat undermines the narrative that this represents innovative thinking from Bier's product team. Meta's Threads began testing user-curated collections in December 2024, presenting them during onboarding to ease discovery of topic-focused accounts. Crucially, Threads' version allows user creation—closer to Bluesky's model than X's controlled approach.

Even Mastodon, the decentralised platform that's never threatened mainstream adoption, has developed comparable 'Packs' for user onboarding. The feature has become table stakes for social platforms trying to solve the discovery problem that plagues every new user's first session.

What's notable is X's decision to diverge from the emerging standard. Bluesky and Threads both recognised that user curation distributes the work of community building whilst giving members agency over their network formation. X has chosen top-down control at the precise moment its userbase fragmentation and advertiser retreat suggest it needs more community-led growth, not less.

The timing follows X's established pattern of adopting competitor features after watching them succeed elsewhere: Spaces after Clubhouse's audio social surge, extended posts after Meta's Threads launched with longer-form content. In each case, X's implementation arrived late and failed to replicate the community dynamics that made the original compelling. Starterpacks appears destined for the same trajectory.

What dating operators should watch

The broader question for dating industry professionals tracking social platform evolution: which discovery mechanics actually work when platforms need to balance safety, engagement, and monetisation? X's approach prioritises control and scalability—easier to maintain editorial oversight of company-created lists than moderate thousands of user-generated packs. But that control comes at the cost of organic community formation, exactly what dating companies need when building audiences around specific relationship models, identity groups, or geographic markets.

As platforms continue experimenting with onboarding and discovery, dating operators should note which implementations preserve user agency and which centralise curatorial power. The former tends to benefit niche communities and underserved audiences. The latter typically reinforces existing hierarchies and algorithmic biases, making it harder for specialised voices to reach their natural audiences. X has chosen its side.