Halceon

Making games, rarely finishing


Facebook has started a paid service. I.e., due to laws in EU they have to offer us to opt in to their data-selling business model. And the alternative they're providing is a paid and ad-free version.

Now, as a Cohost Plus! member (subscribe, it's good for you!), I do think that social media is generally a product worth paying for.

BUTT

Facebook has spent its entire existence building itself into a thing based around showing you ads. Which means that the place it has in my life has almost nothing to do with its supposed core appeal. I don't go there to read posts from friends. I check notifications for discussions in groups; events; birthdays; the family groupchat. Roughly in that order.

Meta wants me to pay ten human euros per month for a product they've been devaluing for forever. It's not worth ten human euros. It's not even worth ten axolotl euros. Drop it to 2 and we might have a conversation.

Also, putting the best target ad audience – people who are willing to pay too much money for a subpar product – out of the reach of ads will lower the value of advertising on FB. We probably won't see a mass advertiser exodus, just like we won't see a mass adoption of the fee. But the competing incentives are interesting.


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