From yesterday, Poles on Facebook and Instagram, which are very popular online services owned by the company Meta, have the option to choose between paying to use the service without ads or watching ads. This option has been introduced by Facebook and Instagram in response to European Union regulations targeting these services concerning data collection for advertising purposes. This refers to so-called user profiling, which involves selecting advertisements that users might potentially be interested in.
Of course, such profiling can be done better or worse, and tailoring advertisements can mean that we not only see ads for products we're interested in, but they are also presented to us in more persuasive language. According to Meta's user-visible offers, the monthly fee for using Facebook and Instagram without ads is €9.99 (today) or approximately €12 (yesterday). The initial subscription includes all connected user accounts and is valid until March 1, 2024 1A new option to choose between paying or watching adverts is a result of changing European Union law, including introduction of restrictions on the collection of data for advertising purposes or the entry into force of the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA) 23.
Does this mean that Facebook will actually track my data and the websites I visit less? Will I be less profiled?
The new option to choose between paying for a subscription and watching ads is the result of changing European Union law, including: introduction of restrictions on the collection of data for advertising purposes or the entry into force of the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA) 123These regulations gradually limit the ability to track users online without their consent, with that consent being the choice between advertising or a paid subscription. However, the introduction of a new choice option does not unequivocally mean that Facebook will track your data less from today onwards. However, under the new regulations, Facebook must provide users with more information about how it collects and uses their data 1If you want to limit Facebook tracking your data, you can adjust your privacy settings. Visit the Privacy Center for information about managing your data, including what information is visible to other users, what data is used to personalize ads, and what tools are available to manage your data 12.
Do you remember how after logging in to FB there was information "that it is and will always be free"?
It turns out that the website's authors were unable to keep their word after being pressured by the European Union. It's easy to imagine that none of the television channels currently available for free would be able to offer their programmes for free if advertising were suddenly banned. Similarly, during Mark Zuckerberg's interrogation in the US Congress some time ago, one Senator (elderly) asked the Facebook CEO, in a broader context, how it was possible that users did not pay for the service that Facebook provided them.
Facebook's CEO responded “Mr. Senator… we run ads.” So the question is to what extent we feel threatened today and how much we value our privacy - in terms of advertising. There are those who do not mind that advertisements are and will be tailored to them, others do not want to provide corporations with information about themselves - even anonymized data about their interests. After all, no one at Facebook's headquarters is personally interested in the fact that nice Marcin Kowalski - a medical student from Wrocław likes to buy erotic gadgets, and his wife quietly buys books on natural medicine - even though this may ultimately lead to their divorce. However, this is important for Faceook advertisers who buy ads on this website. So if Marcin, when opening his laptop during classes and turning on Facebook for a moment, wants to be sure that he won't see a whip ad, and his wife doesn't want her husband to be annoyed every day by advertisements for Sister Anastazja's medicinal herbs, purchasing such a subscription makes some sense.