Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Test Will Let You Message Strangers For $1
Spy Handler writes "According to PC Mag, 'Facebook is testing a feature that will let select users pay $1 to send messages to people with whom they have no connection on the social network. The $1 fee will open a thread with a non-Facebook friend. If that person replies to your note, you won't have to pay again to respond to them.' Facebook explained the test thus: 'Several commentators and researchers have noted that imposing a financial cost on the sender may be the most effective way to discourage unwanted messages and facilitate delivery of messages that are relevant and useful. This test is designed to address situations where neither social nor algorithmic signals are sufficient. For example, if you want to send a message to someone you heard speak at an event but are not friends with, or if you want to message someone about a job opportunity, you can use this feature to reach their Inbox. For the receiver, this test allows them to hear from people who have an important message to send them.'"
The suggestion was to charge a tenth of a penny per email. For regular folks who email, that works up to less than a penny per day. (No fees for business emails from private or hosted exchange servers, of course.) This would discourage spam emails and mass marketings from public accounts (although it wouldn't stop spam from zombie email accounts on private domains.)
A dollar per message should be enough to discourage irresponsible spamming.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
How does Facebook deserve this money?
Because they say so?
Wrong. Try again. Facebook has always been and should forever remain free, and you should have been able to message everyone regardless of connection in the first place. Stupid.
I don't want to make long lost friends pay to send me a message
They can send you a friend request at no charge.
Seems to me that I should be able to let anybody contact me
I believe that's called making your e-mail address public.
How does Facebook deserve this money?
They're managing to convince people to pay it. Naturally!
When you pay the grocery store for a tin of nuts, the nuts do not get a cut.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
They do not, of course. It's all about the money. If they truly wanted to punish spammers, it would be a system more like this:
1. You pay $1 to send message to someone with no connection on your social network.
2. If that someone acknowledges that the message as legit (sender may be a long lost friend, or maybe a polite non-spam email), then you get $1 refunded, so it would not have cost you anything. Essentially, you go out on a limb with $1 to reach that person and let that person judge if you had bothered/spammed them.
3. If the recipient does not do anything, or even marks the message as spam, then the sender would lose that $1, and the $1 goes to the recipient, as he is being compensated for having to deal with spammers.
I expect spammers to start using stolen credit cards to send spam. In the end it will cost the CC owners and their banks money while FB most likely gets to keep the money. Depends if the banks force a charge back or not. Sometimes they do and sometimes they write it off and wait fro the government to give them money.
How does Facebook deserve this money?
If you stay on Facebook, you implicitly acknowledge that they do, because you still judge the overall value of their service to be positive despite this added "inconvenience".
That $1 is just for the general riff-raff.
Spammers buy in bulk and get much better rates.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!