Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced his company will be launching a new subscription service called Meta Verified. This service will provide Facebook users with a blue badge, “extra impersonation protection against accounts claiming to be you,” and “direct access to customer support,” he wrote in his Sunday morning message.
“This new feature is about increasing authenticity and security across our services,” Zuckerberg wrote.
The service will cost $11.99 per month if it’s purchased on the web or $14.99 if “users subscribe through the company’s apps on iOS and Android,” according to technology blog Engadget. “The subscription will cover both Instagram and Facebook accounts.”
The rollout will begin this week in Australia and New Zealand and more countries will be added soon, Zuckerberg said.
12 bucks a month to be verified on Facebook… I wonder if people will keep that same Twitter Blue outrage energy 😅 pic.twitter.com/ZPJsIHBerO
— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) February 19, 2023
Engadget reported rumors that Meta would be offering a paid verification service began earlier this month “when reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi discovered code referencing ‘paid blue badge’ and ‘identity verification.’
“On early Sunday morning, social media consultant and former Next Web reporter Matt Navarra found that Meta had published an Instagram support page detailing the subscription, only to later take it down before Zuckerberg’s Instagram post,” the report said.
It’s too early to tell if this news will be received with the same outrage that accompanied Twitter CEO Elon Musk’s announcement that Twitter “blue checks” would have to pony up $8 per month to maintain their “verified” status. The service, up until November, had been free.
At the time, according to the BBC, Musk said the new fee was “essential to defeat spam/scam.” He added that “paid users would have priority in replies and searches, and half as many advertisements.”
Critics expressed concern that the “move could make it harder to identify reliable sources.”
Nu Wexler, former Twitter Head of Global Policy Communications, told the BBC that charging users a monthly fee for the blue check could “make it harder to spot disinformation.”
“With disinformation as an issue that a lot of platforms are struggling with, verification is one of the ways that journalists, academic researchers and some users use to filter out disinformation or low quality information,” Wexler said.
He added, “If you’re offering up blue checks for rent, it makes it harder to sift through disinformation and find high quality information.”
I got kicked off of F.B. 2 weeks before the 2020 election. (How convenient). I had been in F.B. jail for NUMEROUS 30-day sentences. (Never had anything less). I joined in 2009 and only got one jail term that year. The next year, 4. The next, 9. The last year on F.B., (2020), I spent a total of 39 days OUT of F.B. jail. My record was 3 hours 14 minutes of being OUT of jail, before I was put back in.
Here was the notice, “On several occasions you have violated our community standards. We have reviewed your history and will sever service as of 10:18AM this date”. Those trying to access my F.B. page was given this notice: THIS ACCOUNT HAS BEEN PERMANENTLY DISABLED.
They not only stated since it had been more than 30 days since my last ‘offense’, that it was NOT appealable, they went on to state, (hypocritically), if I groveled just right, genuflected, kissed Mark Z’s ring, and then stuck my tongue up his ass far enough, they would ‘review my account’ for readmission. They also posted EVERY post, (from 2009) which landed me in ‘jail’. I have to admit – it was IMPRESSIVE. Most posts were:
FACTS about abortion.
FACTS about who funds Planned Parenthood every year.
FACTS about NIGGERS
FACTS about Muslims
…and the icing on the cake post 2 weeks before the election? FACTS about the Hunter laptop.
I gave Mark Z. my notice (via snail mail): FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU…IN THE ASS – SIDEWAYS. ONE BULLET IN LESS THAN ONE SECOND, MY FRIEND. THAT’S ALL IT’S GOING TO TAKE…
The FBI was at my door w/i 48 hours. (FUCK THEM TOO)!