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pj_mukh 3 hours ago [-]
I would pay $49.99/mo for an unlimited plan that brings me only my friends' status updates (not their hyper-political likes and comments), just their life updates. Daily stories are great too. But JUST that, no influencers, no ads.
I realize Meta's data shows that our user revealed preferences tells them that we like all the dopamine hijacking garbage but that's like saying "Well users like drugs, so we gave them more". Let me pay you to give me just the vitamins, and none of the sugar.
tim-projects 3 hours ago [-]
Pay each of your friends $50 one per month, to switch to signal. Problem solved
lukeschlather 2 hours ago [-]
Signal is designed with the assumption that data is sensitive and you should err on the side of destroying it.
Facebook is designed more as a shared scrapbook, with the assumption that data is precious and you want to share it with your community, and you should err on the side of oversharing so you don't lose any precious moments. Signal is in no way a replacement for Facebook.
tim-projects 2 hours ago [-]
> Signal is designed with the assumption that data is sensitive and you should err on the side of destroying it.
That's... Just not true
> Facebook is designed more as a shared scrapbook
Have you used Facebook in the last 5 years? Its nothing like this at all.
lukeschlather 1 hours ago [-]
> Have you used Facebook in the last 5 years? Its nothing like this at all.
I use it all the time. Yesterday I was talking to a friend, and we were reminiscing about visiting another friend's house, and we looked up some old birthday party invitations to help us remember when we had been there.
pj_mukh 20 seconds ago [-]
This is exactly what I want Facebook for.
DANmode 2 hours ago [-]
It is if Facebook was never a good fit for you in the first place.
freedomben 3 hours ago [-]
$50 per month for unlimited, not $50 per friend, so your solution only works if you only have 1 friend, so it would work for me (self-deprecating joke) but may not for GP.
lostlogin 3 hours ago [-]
> Pay each of your friends $50 one per month
It an outlay of $50 a moth. Probably better to pay 50/number of friends though.
rkomorn 2 hours ago [-]
$50 a moth? How about just a lightbulb and an open window?
lostlogin 1 hours ago [-]
It took me several re reads to get it.
fsflover 3 hours ago [-]
Or, better, Mastodon or Matrix, which don't rely on a single, easy-to-target server.
dreamcompiler 3 hours ago [-]
This works for friends and family members who are computer geeks. Signal for everybody else.
fsflover 2 hours ago [-]
I don't see what's missing in Matrix. Yes, the verification may be somewhat cumbersome, but I helped to deal with it, and it just works now.
hgoel 1 hours ago [-]
A friend and I have been running a private Matrix server for almost a decade now, it's very lacking in comparison to what the average chat user (especially discord) is used to.
No custom emojis, no self-chat, embeds are inconsistent (e.g. encrypted rooms), multi-image uploads aren't a thing in many clients, adding text when sending an attachment isn't a thing, just to name things we've run into over the years. Most of these have been brought up to the devs many years ago, only to spend forever in spec hell and never actually make it into a release.
We're just tolerating these, because we explicitly moved off discord to have control over our data, but being tech savvy we can handle this. It's nowhere near good enough that I could use it with less savvy people.
john01dav 2 hours ago [-]
Everything about matrix is cumbersome and glitchy. I have last tried to use it a few years ago and it seemed that Riot/Element had the only decent clients, and those were all Electron on desktop and also seemingly for profit. Signal has the electron problem, as well as many others (like the backup UI being abhorrent), but at least the core functionality works without fuss.
I’ve been considering it but I am not sure if it drops just ads or suggested posts as well.
tmaly 1 hours ago [-]
I am surprised someone hasn't made a really nice equivalent to Obsidian for Mastadon and just released it for free on the app stores. I am sure one could host a very cheap mastadon instance on a low cost VPS
canyp 1 hours ago [-]
Why? You are still giving up privacy. There is 0 reason to be using Meta products, let alone pay for them.
uyzstvqs 2 hours ago [-]
What you need is the Stories feature in Signal, then donate that $49.99/month (or however much you want) to their foundation.
bflesch 3 hours ago [-]
Nah once they know you can be fleeced for $50 per month, they also know there is much more money to extract from you. Their advertisers would be mad if they remove this juicy cohort of moneybags from their audience.
jsrozner 3 hours ago [-]
This is absurd. You're just asking for reasonable control over data that ostensibly belongs to you. Moreover, this minimum functionality was resolved years ago with RSS. That you'd be willing to pay so much reflects how well every tech company is doing at using tech against its own users.
pj_mukh 3 hours ago [-]
Ehhh, what I'm paying for is FB/Insta's ability to bring everyone onto one platform and encourage them to post regularly. RSS, AOL Messenger etc, never were able to do that with any decent success.
That they went past that to just kill their own golden goose is what is now reversible via a payment plan. That might be their only saving grace on this now managed decline.
drnick1 2 hours ago [-]
Just stop using Meta products. It's really not as hard as it seems. Nobody needs FB to communicate with friends and family. Send texts or emails or use your phone.
Starman_Jones 2 hours ago [-]
The hardest part about not using Meta products is deciding not to use meta products. When I stopped using Facebook, I had resigned myself to spending a lot of time and effort to stay in touch with my friends and family. As it turns out, all I had to do was mention that I was using Signal, and the people closest to me, then pretty close to me, then kinda close to me all started using that too. The network effect cuts both ways.
alex1138 2 hours ago [-]
Actually it... is but not (just) for the reasons people give (social utility)
You delete a FB acct? It reactivates. Fun! Almost like the company is built off fraud
Iuz 1 hours ago [-]
[dead]
Animats 3 hours ago [-]
"It's free and always will be" - Facebook
ravenstine 3 hours ago [-]
Whenever companies make statements like this and then people act surprised when they backtrack, I can't help but think of a bit of my favorite dialogue from Star Trek Enterprise.
HARRIS: We had an arrangement!
KRELL: You did what I wanted. I don't need you anymore.
HARRIS: You agreed that both our governments would benefit if the two of us worked together.
Followed by him overwriting people's email addresses and constantly fucking around with privacy settings
Ohhhh but he was young! Be easy on him
(/s)
shevy-java 3 hours ago [-]
Not only that, but Spybook aka Facebook, also connected offline information, e. g. I think if I recall it was dental care or something like that. I don't remember the year (edit: a google search led me to this article from 2018, but I could swear this was several years before that - see https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-43668607), but it was scary that they go and sniff for ALL data they can find about people. This brings mega-corporation to a new level of Evil. And I haven't even gotten to talk about Google here, yet ...
YesBox 3 hours ago [-]
Discord subscriptions seem to be working. People like to customize their profile (ie express themselves), even though profiles are not something frequently interacted with (that's the surprising part!)
I have a server (for my game) with about 1000 people. Out of the 300 people logged in, 50 of them have custom profiles.
So, it seems like a good idea for Meta.
ro_bit 2 hours ago [-]
You can get free profile decorations these days from watching ads (discord “orbs”). It would be interesting to know how many of those users have the nitro subscription badge next to their name
YesBox 2 hours ago [-]
I just counted 35 online profiles with nitro. Same ~300 people online currently
sillysaurusx 3 hours ago [-]
How’d you make a game with 1,000 people? It’s impressive.
YesBox 3 hours ago [-]
They're players, not devs.
sillysaurusx 2 hours ago [-]
Yeah, I was asking how you got so many players.
YesBox 2 hours ago [-]
Forgive me for not wanting to write up the history of the game's development. It boils down to product market fit, innovation, and fantasy fulfillment/fun.
tbh I mostly pay for nitro for cross-server, animated emoji
fontain 3 hours ago [-]
The main problem is that premium subscriptions don’t generate that much revenue when compared to ads alone. The users who pay are the most valuable users to advertisers and the users who don’t pay are the least valuable. Discord generates about $1 in revenue per user compared to Facebook at closer to $100. For Discord at $1 per user, any subscription that’s a few dollars or more is probably paying for the lost advertising revenue, but it wouldn’t translate for Meta so they aren’t including ad free which drastically reduces the value.
I’ll be surprised if Meta’s subscriptions are as popular as Discord’s without being advertising free. Cosmetics are liked amongst Discord’s audience of nerds, but not Meta’s audience of normal people.
Very interested to see how this works out for Meta. Since they’re not excluding ads, it’s basically free money, so they may as well offer these subscriptions.
rhines 3 hours ago [-]
I wish these companies didn't need to make billions in revenue. There's no reason why a small company couldn't manage a site like Discord, make enough to pay their developers, and be successful. But instead every company needs to become a unicorn and pay investors billions.
lukeschlather 2 hours ago [-]
I actually cancelled my Discord subscription because they've gradually been adding more intrusive ads and subscriptions don't protect you from ads.
rossjudson 3 hours ago [-]
I think that subscribing to another person's life prevents you from living your own. Also, "Everything is Lies, I Guess".
flufluflufluffy 2 hours ago [-]
> There are also other features like Super Heart animated reactions for Stories, custom app icons, customizable fonts for profile bios, and access to additional pins for your profile.
Ahh, remember the days of livejournal/myspace, where we got all of those “features” for free because your profile is literally a fucking webpage
canyp 3 hours ago [-]
Seems absolutely unhinged. I don't know who'd pay to doomscroll AI-generated slop and fake news. $49.99 for the top plan, lol.
3 hours ago [-]
DANmode 3 hours ago [-]
But they know who.
princevegeta89 3 hours ago [-]
Interesting. Instagram and Facebook both seem to be filled with AI-generated fake crap today. Even the so-called news items that I see there seem to be fake. I don't even know who would be subscribing. Especially to Facebook as of today....
It is filled with pretty low quality content overall. On the other side, WhatsApp has been getting filled with a lot of bloat. And even today, I find it confusing to use communities in WhatsApp. The entire navigation and experience around that feature confused me a few times. There's been more and more push towards the AI crap on WhatsApp as well.
The only good thing about WhatsApp is, it is used by everyone that I know, so I can connect with them pretty easily and make calls, etc. I hope they don't enshittify it too much to the point where I'll go and use Signal full time.
shevy-java 3 hours ago [-]
> Instagram and Facebook both seem to be filled with AI-generated fake crap today.
Also youtube, unfortunately. Google does not understand that AI is slowly killing youtube.
I am an expert cat video person, so noticing AI slop is not so hard, but it takes a few seconds (e. g. a mother cat punishing the young cat for "overreach" - the way how the AI video insinuated reality was of course completely false, AI spam slop that lies to real humans). I'd rather wish Google would not waste my time (then again, why am I still using youtube ... one day I'll be degoogled for good. The sooner Google is gone from this planet, the better.)
princevegeta89 2 hours ago [-]
And also, pretty much any internet-generated social media content, basically. Reddit is another classic example. If you look at many posts in subreddits containing a huge number of users, you could easily tell it is AI-generated, especially these idiotic "Am I the asshole" posts or "askreddit" posts and any other posts involving interesting situations.
Not just that. Even comments, some of those are basically AI crap, cleverly disguised as real users. It is such a waste, honestly. AI has brought upon us a low-quality world to live in, out of nowhere. This is such a pity.
CuriouslyC 2 hours ago [-]
Shorts are a dumpster fire in terms of fake content. Full length videos are a lot better, as YT has been cracking down on AI generated regular videos, though there are still a fair number of AI narrated/scripted videos and deepfakes of prolific interviewees.
yokoprime 3 hours ago [-]
That's not happening
shevy-java 3 hours ago [-]
> In an announcement, Meta’s head of product, Naomi Gleit, noted that “more fun features” will be added in the future.
Thank you - I don't want any of that.
What exactly are "fun" features, anyway? Do they take away from my time?
j45 3 hours ago [-]
Maybe they could sell privacy/encrypted messages in the subscription after removing it.
suddenlybananas 3 hours ago [-]
It's a real shame private messaging has ended up being almost exclusively closed-source without any kind of open API.
jjordan 3 hours ago [-]
How did we let this happen? We used to have open protocols, apps like Pidgin that would bring multiple chat clients together under one interface, IRC, Skype P2P, etc. etc.
Was it spammers that caused this mass migration to ever more closed platforms?
NegativeK 3 hours ago [-]
The vast majority of people aren't aware of open versus closed protocols. If enough people they want to communicate with are using it to counterbalance how frustrating it is, they'll use it. It happened because businesses realized there's profit in lock in, and they threw resources at it.
Open protocols are still there and still used, but we're sad because the smaller userbase is frustrating. Just like how people still publish human written content to personal blogs, but they're proportionally non-existent.
tim-projects 3 hours ago [-]
They all still exist, but we don't have the collective courage to use them when it means you might miss a status update from your friends.
regexorcist 3 hours ago [-]
In the EU at least WhatsApp is being forced to interop with other messaging apps. I believe it's being rolled out at the moment.
tgv 3 hours ago [-]
Yeah, there are precisely two apps that can exchange with Whatsapp: one is still in beta, the other is by invite only, and for "professional networking" or something like that. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46746476
qweiopqweiop 3 hours ago [-]
Those features sound so narcissistic to me
meta_ai_x 3 hours ago [-]
Friendly reminder: HN opinion about this will be completely-out-of-touch with reality
alex1138 3 hours ago [-]
What reality? The reality is almost nobody likes using Facebook (and many people can't anyway because they get banned while the racist thing or whatever they report never gets taken down) because it doesn't work, messages are hit and miss, nobody sees any status updates, and it's 20 ads per post
SilverElfin 3 hours ago [-]
Who is this for? Is it just a way to monetize dying platforms before they inevitably become worthless?
dreamcompiler 3 hours ago [-]
The last stage of Doctorow's enshittification cycle is "Then, they die."
It's insane that those subscriptions don't remove ads. That's the only thing I would even remotely consider paying for on any meta product.
In the current state those subscriptions will just show your friends that you're a huge loser who's willing to pay for custom backgrounds.
figglestar 2 hours ago [-]
People who pay subscriptions are exactly the sort of people you want to advertise to the most since they've signaled they have money. It's like flashing a big wad of cash in a seedy bar.
fontain 3 hours ago [-]
Unfortunately, Meta’s ad business is so effective that they would need to charge hundreds of dollars per year for an ad free service just to keep revenue stable. I suspect anything less than $25 per month would be loss making for them.
CuriouslyC 2 hours ago [-]
Honestly don't know how Meta keeps customers. Facebook is hanging on for dear life with geriatrics and marketplace. Insta is a cesspool of fake content that needs to die in a dumpster fire. Not sure why you'd use WhatsApp over alternatives like Signal now.
It's almost like the people still using Meta services are metaphorical bots or low agency human beings.
I realize Meta's data shows that our user revealed preferences tells them that we like all the dopamine hijacking garbage but that's like saying "Well users like drugs, so we gave them more". Let me pay you to give me just the vitamins, and none of the sugar.
Facebook is designed more as a shared scrapbook, with the assumption that data is precious and you want to share it with your community, and you should err on the side of oversharing so you don't lose any precious moments. Signal is in no way a replacement for Facebook.
That's... Just not true
> Facebook is designed more as a shared scrapbook
Have you used Facebook in the last 5 years? Its nothing like this at all.
I use it all the time. Yesterday I was talking to a friend, and we were reminiscing about visiting another friend's house, and we looked up some old birthday party invitations to help us remember when we had been there.
It an outlay of $50 a moth. Probably better to pay 50/number of friends though.
No custom emojis, no self-chat, embeds are inconsistent (e.g. encrypted rooms), multi-image uploads aren't a thing in many clients, adding text when sending an attachment isn't a thing, just to name things we've run into over the years. Most of these have been brought up to the devs many years ago, only to spend forever in spec hell and never actually make it into a release.
We're just tolerating these, because we explicitly moved off discord to have control over our data, but being tech savvy we can handle this. It's nowhere near good enough that I could use it with less savvy people.
I’ve been considering it but I am not sure if it drops just ads or suggested posts as well.
That they went past that to just kill their own golden goose is what is now reversible via a payment plan. That might be their only saving grace on this now managed decline.
You delete a FB acct? It reactivates. Fun! Almost like the company is built off fraud
HARRIS: We had an arrangement!
KRELL: You did what I wanted. I don't need you anymore.
HARRIS: You agreed that both our governments would benefit if the two of us worked together.
KRELL: And you believed me.
Ohhhh but he was young! Be easy on him
(/s)
I have a server (for my game) with about 1000 people. Out of the 300 people logged in, 50 of them have custom profiles.
So, it seems like a good idea for Meta.
See for yourself: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2287430/Metropolis_1998/
I’ll be surprised if Meta’s subscriptions are as popular as Discord’s without being advertising free. Cosmetics are liked amongst Discord’s audience of nerds, but not Meta’s audience of normal people.
Very interested to see how this works out for Meta. Since they’re not excluding ads, it’s basically free money, so they may as well offer these subscriptions.
Ahh, remember the days of livejournal/myspace, where we got all of those “features” for free because your profile is literally a fucking webpage
The only good thing about WhatsApp is, it is used by everyone that I know, so I can connect with them pretty easily and make calls, etc. I hope they don't enshittify it too much to the point where I'll go and use Signal full time.
Also youtube, unfortunately. Google does not understand that AI is slowly killing youtube.
I am an expert cat video person, so noticing AI slop is not so hard, but it takes a few seconds (e. g. a mother cat punishing the young cat for "overreach" - the way how the AI video insinuated reality was of course completely false, AI spam slop that lies to real humans). I'd rather wish Google would not waste my time (then again, why am I still using youtube ... one day I'll be degoogled for good. The sooner Google is gone from this planet, the better.)
Not just that. Even comments, some of those are basically AI crap, cleverly disguised as real users. It is such a waste, honestly. AI has brought upon us a low-quality world to live in, out of nowhere. This is such a pity.
Thank you - I don't want any of that.
What exactly are "fun" features, anyway? Do they take away from my time?
Was it spammers that caused this mass migration to ever more closed platforms?
Open protocols are still there and still used, but we're sad because the smaller userbase is frustrating. Just like how people still publish human written content to personal blogs, but they're proportionally non-existent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification
In the current state those subscriptions will just show your friends that you're a huge loser who's willing to pay for custom backgrounds.
It's almost like the people still using Meta services are metaphorical bots or low agency human beings.