Live data from Hacker News

Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

techcrunch.com

71–80 of 533 posts

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#71
post #11

I would pay $49.99/mo for an unlimited plan that brings me only my friends' status updates (not their hyper-political likes and comments), just their life updates. Daily stories are great too. But JUST that, no influencers, no ads. I realize Meta's data shows that our user revealed preferences tells them that we like all the dopamine hijacking garbage but that's like saying "Well users like drugs, so we gave them mor…

I am surprised someone hasn't made a really nice equivalent to Obsidian for Mastadon and just released it for free on the app stores. I am sure one could host a very cheap mastadon instance on a low cost VPS

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Signal is designed with the assumption that data is sensitive and you should err on the side of destroying it. That's... Just not true > Facebook is designed more as a shared scrapbook Have you used Facebook in the last 5 years? Its nothing like this at all.

> Have you used Facebook in the last 5 years? Its nothing like this at all. I use it all the time. Yesterday I was talking to a friend, and we were reminiscing about visiting another friend's house, and we looked up some old birthday party invitations to help us remember when we had been there.

This is exactly what I want Facebook for. The network has all this value baked in, but they'll have to look past its obsession with ads and slop.

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#73
post #46

Just stop using Meta products. It's really not as hard as it seems. Nobody needs FB to communicate with friends and family. Send texts or emails or use your phone.

I don’t know about other places, but in SF, everything around schools is coordinated over WhatsApp—you’d be really doing your children a disservice to opt out.

And I hate it. I had deactivated all my Meta accounts but reactivated WhatsApp because of school stuff.

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#74
post #46

Just stop using Meta products. It's really not as hard as it seems. Nobody needs FB to communicate with friends and family. Send texts or emails or use your phone.

There are lots of other important uses for these platforms.

For the down voters: Such as finding local business information or events in your community, and tons of other stuff which isn't anywhere else.

Facebook + Instagram already has more current information than the rest of the web combined.

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#75
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is absurd. You're just asking for reasonable control over data that ostensibly belongs to you. Moreover, this minimum functionality was resolved years ago with RSS. That you'd be willing to pay so much reflects how well every tech company is doing at using tech against its own users.

Ehhh, what I'm paying for is FB/Insta's ability to bring everyone onto one platform and encourage them to post regularly. RSS, AOL Messenger etc, never were able to do that with any decent success. That they went past that to just kill their own golden goose is what is now reversible via a payment plan. That might be their only saving grace on this now managed decline.

But FB/Insta haven't been able to get everyone onto one platform. Generations are balkanized across FB, Instagram, and WhatsApp (all of which Meta bought precisely because it can’t manage with its original social network), and TikTok.

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#76
post #8

"It's free and always will be" - Facebook

I'd bet good money this is mostly related to Europe's GDPR / DMA actions against Facebook. Ironically, I think Facebook would be in the clear to just charge everyone in Europe and dump ads altogether. :shrug:

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#77

Honestly don't know how Meta keeps customers. Facebook is hanging on for dear life with geriatrics and marketplace. Insta is a cesspool of fake content that needs to die in a dumpster fire. Not sure why you'd use WhatsApp over alternatives like Signal now. It's almost like the people still using Meta services are metaphorical bots or low agency human beings.

WhatsApp: all school stuff seems to be coordinated over WhatsApp

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#78
post #46

Just stop using Meta products. It's really not as hard as it seems. Nobody needs FB to communicate with friends and family. Send texts or emails or use your phone.

You are years behind. It was in 2016 that, when traveling and wanting to exchange contacts with cool local people I met, I first began to get the response “My e-mail address? I don’t have email.” Already then many younger people were only on social media, and it was expected that you would exchange those contacts. And some countries never had the email moment at all, so even older people don’t use it.

Ditto for phones, if you mean the PSTN – as time goes on, fewer and fewer people have ever really used that. When people around the world are communicating via their smartphones with a phone-number-based protocol, it’s overwhelmingly WhatsApp, and guess who owns that?

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#79
post #11

I would pay $49.99/mo for an unlimited plan that brings me only my friends' status updates (not their hyper-political likes and comments), just their life updates. Daily stories are great too. But JUST that, no influencers, no ads. I realize Meta's data shows that our user revealed preferences tells them that we like all the dopamine hijacking garbage but that's like saying "Well users like drugs, so we gave them mor…

I don't believe for a second you'd pay $50 per month!

Yeah you'd do it to prove a point. 6 months later, no way in hell.

Re: Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

#80
post #78
post #46

Just stop using Meta products. It's really not as hard as it seems. Nobody needs FB to communicate with friends and family. Send texts or emails or use your phone.

You are years behind. It was in 2016 that, when traveling and wanting to exchange contacts with cool local people I met, I first began to get the response “My e-mail address? I don’t have email.” Already then many younger people were only on social media, and it was expected that you would exchange those contacts. And some countries never had the email moment at all, so even older people don’t use it. Ditto for phone…

What's actually being said is that these people are not your friends/family and probably shouldn't be.

That definitely sounds harsher than intended. It's a meditation really. Nobody needs FB and Instagram. (please read as a meditation)

Post reply on HN