Meta launches Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp subscriptions

Post by haritha-j » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 9:02 AM UTC

qqtt wrote: post #98

I'm going to go against the grain here and say this is probably a positive thing for Meta products, and honestly every other "free" service to provide these kinds of revenue avenues. How many times do we hear things like "if the product is free, you are the product" - well, the consequence of that is development resources tend to be pulled into directions that benefit advertisers. By having material subscription reve…

Post by cpt_sobel » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 9:18 AM UTC

brianmiddleton wrote: post #323

HnUser12 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may not get ads in the app, but they can still sell your data for other services who will give you ads.

You WILL be getting ads in the app, though. There's nothing in the article that says you won't. This is like Snapchat's subscription. You get more features, but still have the ads. This isn't replacing "if it's free, you're the product", it's "if you're willing to pay, you're an even more valuable product".

Post by Lutger » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 9:23 AM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #334

sensanaty wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You paying just signals that you're someone to push more ads to and to harvest more data on, since it means you have disposable income to spend on something as useless as instagram or facebook. Meta isn't going to stop harvesting all your information just because you pay for a subscription, they'll harvest and sell your data AND take your money.

> You paying just signals that you're someone to push more ads to and to harvest more data on No, qqtt is correct that if you're paying, you get a vote. It may not be all that much of a vote, but it's more than you'd have if you weren't paying, and Meta will pay attention to it. For a recent example of how this works, consider that with the post-October-7th wave of pro-Palestinian activism on US college campuses, a l…

Post by Traubenfuchs » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 9:28 AM UTC

dgellow wrote: post #337

dabedee wrote: post #335

It's very difficult to do business in Western Europe without Whatsapp. I have probably asked more than 60 people to switch to Signal and the social burden it introduces (i.e. asking a new acquaintance to install a new app) can have negative signalling effects (e.g. you don't adapt, create more work, why do you care so much about privacy, etc.) I personally abhore Facebook (and IG,Whatsapp) and don't want to use any o…

Telegram is fairly common in Western Europe

Post by Traubenfuchs » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 9:29 AM UTC

pj_mukh wrote: 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…