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Judging from the article, it seems that the only reason for this is to shut down regulators with this argument: "You want us to stop tracking users? Users already have that option, it's a subscription". So I believe the pricing is intentionally outrageous, it's not really meant as a reasonable choice.
Judging from the article, it seems that the only reason for this is to shut down regulators with this argument: "You want us to stop tracking users? Users already have that option, it's a subscription". So I believe the pricing is intentionally outrageous, it's not really meant as a reasonable choice.
> The Silicon Valley-based company has until the end of November to comply with a Luxembourg court ruling from this year which found that Facebook “cannot justify” the use of personal data to target consumers with ads unless it gains their consent. The court said companies should explore a subscription model in its ruling.
This is obviously not a serious offer, it is just so they can tell the court “I told you so.”
Facebook’s business model is not really compatible with a society that values privacy. But I don’t think anybody wants to be responsible for pointing out the incompatibility.
So for $14 I get no ads but I'm still tracked?
It won't happen overnight and it won't happen if this is always a fringe use case not worth worrying about.
This also impacts some of the revenue analysis other people have posted. If Facebook makes a bit less money on someone but can cut their costs by more, Facebook can still come out ahead with a subscription. Obviously this won't be true right out of the gate because they won't be able to rely on it initially, but possibly in the future this may impact things.
I mean, after all, if you cut out the immense spend they're making to throw ads at you, how much would it actually cost to provide the "good" part of Facebook's services to an average user? It really isn't much and it continues to drop.
Judging from the article, it seems that the only reason for this is to shut down regulators with this argument: "You want us to stop tracking users? Users already have that option, it's a subscription". So I believe the pricing is intentionally outrageous, it's not really meant as a reasonable choice.
Also, how would they prevent people posting ads from falling through the cracks?
I think this is a "trick" to get around the GDPR. Many European newspapers already do this: The GDPR says that it is not allowed that the user who denies their personal data to be stored experiences negative consequences because of that. So in theory, behavioral advertising is dead in Europe. Because nobody would voluntarily agree to be tracked. For some reason, many companies go the "Our service is available in two…
I think even in Europe the claim that any company has an obligation to serve you for 100% free, getting nothing out of it whatsoever, is not going to fly very far.
It isn't even a moral issue per se; it's just impossible. Companies need some sort of income. One can speculate on how nice it would be if that were not the case, but if it weren't we'd live in a very different world anyhow, beyond the realm of speculation (it isn't necessarily all better than ours in every way).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd wager that 14$/month is actually really cheap given who will pay for it. The average per user may be $5.96, but I imagine that the people who will pay 14 $/month have more disposable income and are therefore in the demographics that advertisers would pay a premium for.
I don't believe the most profitable users care about ads.
Will it give me the option to only see stuff from people I follow? Because the worst part of Facebook and Instagram is not the ads but the content that is shown to me to keep me engaged. I want to scroll my friends pictures and when there are no new pictures I want the feed to stop. I'd pay for this even if am still shown targeted ads.
I have a better solution for ad free facebook and instagram access. Bibliogram or any other open source frontend to access public profiles. Otherwise, just stop using Meta's products. EDIT what's most interesting is that people from here are actually considering it to be a good deal. Paying to have your privacy "preserved" by a super shady and unethical company like Meta is not a win. You're negotiating with the devi…