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Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

arstechnica.com

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Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#51

Post by i_am_jl »

aunty_helen wrote: post #18
i_am_jl wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if creating a paid tier of users that won't see ads significantly devalues Meta's advertising proposition. From the perspective of an advertiser, I don't really see the appeal in running an ad on a platform where all the users who have signaled they have disposable income and are willing to pay for online services don't see any ads.

Potentially these paying users weren’t the market anyway. Someone willing to pay to not see your ads maybe hostile to any brand forcing them in front of their eyeballs.

That's possible. I thought most people with that mindset would be running adblockers, so probably wouldn't be interested in paying for an ad-free experience.

I'm sure there are people who aren't aware of adblockers or aren't savvy enough to use them, but how many?

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#52

Post by olalonde »

dax_ wrote: post #33

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.

Doubtful. Facebook's mission is to maximize profits, not to maximize ads served. If they thought they could generate more profits by lowering priced subscriptions or even getting rid of the free, ad-supported tier, they would absolutely go for it. The inconvenient truth is that the only way to get a lot of users to pay for Facebook is through ads, because they won't pay for a subscription, no matter the price point. If the free tier disappeared, there would be a mass exodus of users from Facebook to a free, ad-supported, competitor.

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#53

Post by mimikatz »

CSMastermind wrote: post #38

Facebook is basically the only place on the internet where I actually like the ads. I've discovered and bought many products from them and Facebook gives me a clean way to block and report ads that I think are bad. Honestly my biggest complaint is that I'll often see something in a Facebook ad, want to buy it 2 months later and there's no way for me to look up which ads I saw on Facebook 2 months ago.

I actually feel the same way. Facebook actually has relevant ads to local events (some of which I am even interested in). As opposed to Google which is trying to drive my purchasing behavior. or Twitter which is borderline useless. It is really the local part the others I missing and where value is provided.

I wonder if that is an ease of use facebook thing for small marketers, better location data, or lower ad costs making it more worthwhile

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#54

Post by yomlica8 »

i_am_jl wrote: post #9
jeremiahlee wrote: post #3

Meta’s monthly average revenue per user in Europe was $5.96 as of 2023-Q2. $14/month is quite the premium to opt out of its privacy invasion. Does Meta really think it is worth more to people than Spotify or Disney+? ARPU source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/251328/facebooks-average...

I wonder if creating a paid tier of users that won't see ads significantly devalues Meta's advertising proposition. From the perspective of an advertiser, I don't really see the appeal in running an ad on a platform where all the users who have signaled they have disposable income and are willing to pay for online services don't see any ads.

No problem, just sell their user data for a premium so they can be advertised too in other ways. Its worth squeezing this one in many extra ways since, as you said, they've signaled they are valuable targets.

Plus Meta can also change it to limited ads later and sell those for bigger money.

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#55

Post by whelp_24 »

paxys wrote: post #35
hgomersall wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selling targeted ads is selling your data (not directly, but selling products that depend on your data). Are they going to continue to use your data to sell targeted ads to others?

Selling your data = "pay us $$$ and we'll give you the name, email, phone number, DoB, SSN, interests, credit score of a million users". Plenty of companies do this today (both legal and illegal), but Facebook isn't one of them. Selling targeted ads = "pay us $$$ and we'll show your ads to people who match the criteria you select". This is very different from the former.

Anonymization is a myth. If you sell ads on proxy data, that data can be deanonymized. Also, Facebook may not directly sell your social security but they sure will buy it from the less scrupulous (but more honest) companies.

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#56

Post by Gasp0de »

octacat wrote: post #49
Gasp0de wrote: post #40

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.

Oh, they want you on the app, so they would specially not show you stuff from friends, so you have to scroll more. If you know that there is no updates - it is not engaging.

But if I pay for no ads, do they need me to engage? Their income is fixed to 14$/month no matter the amount of engagement. Actually, they save server costs if I engage less.

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#57

Post by jareklupinski »

mimikatz wrote: post #53
CSMastermind wrote: post #38

Facebook is basically the only place on the internet where I actually like the ads. I've discovered and bought many products from them and Facebook gives me a clean way to block and report ads that I think are bad. Honestly my biggest complaint is that I'll often see something in a Facebook ad, want to buy it 2 months later and there's no way for me to look up which ads I saw on Facebook 2 months ago.

I actually feel the same way. Facebook actually has relevant ads to local events (some of which I am even interested in). As opposed to Google which is trying to drive my purchasing behavior. or Twitter which is borderline useless. It is really the local part the others I missing and where value is provided. I wonder if that is an ease of use facebook thing for small marketers, better location data, or lower ad costs…

> Facebook actually has relevant ads to local events (some of which I am even interested in). As opposed to Google which is trying to drive my purchasing behavior. or Twitter which is borderline useless

i wonder, has Google ever tried showing ads that were irrelevent to your current search query, but still relevant to your purchaser profile?

that way they could surface relevant search results (keeping you coming back and showcasing their core business case), while _also_ appealing to your interests

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#58

Post by paxys »

whelp_24 wrote: post #55
paxys wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selling your data = "pay us $$$ and we'll give you the name, email, phone number, DoB, SSN, interests, credit score of a million users". Plenty of companies do this today (both legal and illegal), but Facebook isn't one of them. Selling targeted ads = "pay us $$$ and we'll show your ads to people who match the criteria you select". This is very different from the former.

Anonymization is a myth. If you sell ads on proxy data, that data can be deanonymized. Also, Facebook may not directly sell your social security but they sure will buy it from the less scrupulous (but more honest) companies.

What is there to deanonymize? Facebook isn't selling anonymized data. The aren't selling any data.

Re: Ad-free Facebook, Instagram access planned for $14 per month in Europe

#60

Post by whelp_24 »

paxys wrote: post #58
whelp_24 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anonymization is a myth. If you sell ads on proxy data, that data can be deanonymized. Also, Facebook may not directly sell your social security but they sure will buy it from the less scrupulous (but more honest) companies.

What is there to deanonymize? Facebook isn't selling anonymized data. The aren't selling any data.

The ad space is data. If you chose the right categories you can reasonably identify someone. The whole purpose of behavioral advertising is to identify groups, you can make those groups =1 if your clever. Look up deanonymization. It's one of those problems that also affect researchers because it's hard to keep db data anonymous too.
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