13 January 2013
EXPLOITATION: Companies have no right to exploit their customers for cash.
By Amy Wang
These days, practically half of our lives are spent on social media platforms. We spend our day updating our Facebook statuses and tweeting about what we just ate for lunch. And nowadays, even friendships can start over a single message from someone on Facebook.
But Facebook wants us to pay for our interactions. Literally.
Last December, Facebook began testing a new messaging system that would cost its users one dollar to message a stranger directly to his or her inbox; this replaces the old system in which users risked having their messages end up in the hidden “Other” folder of the recipient’s inbox. It is currently limited to U.S. users (companies excluded) and only allows one outgoing, paid message per week.
One dollar can buy you a drink or a snack, but one measly message that may or may not be read? That’s a heavy price to pay. In fact, even a text message costs less than a quarter of that.
Facebook posted on its company blog that imposing a cost would be “the most effective way to discourage unwanted messages” and help filter only the “relevant and useful” messages through to the receiver.
But there are more ways to battle spam and receive the important messages than to charge users—limiting the number of messages, for example.
The biggest problem here is not the money (okay, so it maybe it is) but the exploitation of the users. A system said to protect them from spam is really more a system for Facebook to gain more profit, as if the advertisements everywhere weren’t enough.
This is our privacy, our business, that we would be paying for. We should not have to pay to talk to others or make others pay to talk to us.
In all fairness, Facebook is not the only social networking site guilty of charging its users for messaging strangers; LinkedIn does it too, although a bit differently, and isn’t on equal grounds with Facebook. But with all of the security changes Facebook implanted in December, it was a bit too soon to impose yet another modification. Let’s hope they discontinue this system quickly.
Facebook’s purpose is “to make the world more open and connected.” Friends or not, users should have the ability to reach out and communicate without worrying about a fee. Facebook, what happened to “free and always will be”? There should never be a price for communication on a website that is free for all.