Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new paid subscription service for Facebook and Instagram on Sunday, giving users a holy blue check for a monthly fee.
Meta Verified will cost $11.99 per month on the web and $14.99 per month on iOS. It’s launching in Australia and New Zealand this week ahead of a wider rollout.
Membership “allows you to verify your account with government ID, get a blue badge, get additional identity theft protection against accounts pretending to be you, and get access direct to customer support,” Zuckerberg said.
The Facebook founder noted that providing direct access to customer support would cost “a significant amount of money,” which will be offset by subscription revenue.
The new option comes after Twitter launched a revamped version of its own paid service, Twitter Blue, which allows users to get a verified profile and other benefits.
Elon Musk launched Twitter Blue shortly after closing his $44 billion deal to buy the company last year. He said at the time that Twitter was experiencing a “massive drop in revenue” due to an exodus of advertisers from the platform.
Meta has faced its own issues over the past year and a half, with the company’s shares down around 54% since its peak in September 2021.
The social media giant has laid off around 11,000 workers in recent months, part of a broader downturn among big tech companies.
New York Post
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