Would you pay for an ad-free Facebook?
If you’re not paying for the product, then you are the product.
That business-world adage has allowed Facebook to thrive, attracting 2 billion users who choose to trade their personal information for no-cost access to the world’s largest social network.
The data they fork over have proven to be a treasure trove for Facebook, which relies on the information to sell ads targeted to specific swaths of users. But after years of exchanging their privacy for a free feed of news, ads, family photos and cat videos, some people are questioning whether they’re actually getting a good deal.
With Facebook under fire for its mishandling of user data in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, the social network is being pressed by some to consider a different business model — one that charges users instead of advertisers and, in turn, is not fueled by personal information.
Facebook appears to be giving it some thought.
When asked about the possibility of a paid service during Senate testimony this week, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said his company would “certainly consider ideas like that.”
It’s a proposal that is winning favor among technologists. Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak recently told USA Today that he’d rather pay for Facebook than have his personal information exploited for advertising.
“Users provide every detail of their life to Facebook and ... Facebook makes a lot of advertising money off this,” Wozniak said. “The profits are all based on the user’s info, but the users get none of the profits back.”
A recent survey conducted by Recode and market research firm Toluna found that 23 percent of respondents said they’d be willing to pay to use a version of Facebook that had no ads. Of those respondents, 41.6 percent said they’d be willing to pay between $1 to $5 per month. The remainder said they would be willing to pay more.
Subscription companies were once an anomaly on the internet, where the prevailing wisdom was that information trended toward free. But in recent years, successful online companies that built their empires on free content supported by advertising have also been exploring pay models.
The general strategy has been to charge for special features, so users feel like they’re getting something extra for their money.
YouTube is available for free, but those who pay can lose the ads and get exclusive content. Spotify lets people listen to music for free, but the paid version cuts out ads and give them more control over how they listen to music. LinkedIn, the social network for job-seekers, lets paying users see who has viewed their profile.
Though consumers have been willing to subscribe to some online services, social media experts say when it comes to firms like Facebook — which has been free since its launch and whose ads can easily be scrolled past — a pay model is unlikely to catch on.
That’s because the core function of Facebook — connecting people — is something that can be done elsewhere without having to pay. The social network could tack on extra features, but social media experts are unsure what features would compel a user fork over cash.
And researchers remain unconvinced that many people would opt to pay simply for their privacy — even as they pay lip service to it.
“The whole fantasy that people care about privacy or they’re desperate to get out of ad-supported networks is ridiculous,” said Clay Shirky, a researcher on the social and economic effects of internet technologies at New York University.