Meta will begin to offer subscriptions of 9.99 euros (for web subscribers) and 12.99 euros (via app) to its users located in the European Union to use Instagram or Facebook without seeing ads. The company continues to believe that its personalized advertising model is the foundation of its business and that it is useful for small businesses and users. “Like other companies, we will continue to advocate for an ad-supported internet, even with our new subscription offering in the EU,” says Meta in a statement, made public today, Monday. “But we respect the spirit and purpose of the evolving European regulations and are committed to complying with them,” he adds.
Until March 2024, the subscription will cover all of a user’s accounts. From then on, 6 euros will be applied on the web and 8 euros via app for each extra account. The network can be used on any medium regardless of where the subscription is made: anyone who subscribes via the web can use their mobile phone for the same price. Meta makes this price distinction to make the user pay the fees imposed by Apple and Google in their App Store and Play Store.
This measure is a response from the company led by Mark Zuckerberg to the siege that is being placed from Brussels on non-consensual tracking of user activity to serve them personalized advertising.
“The ad-free subscription option meets the requirements of European regulators while offering users choice and allows Meta to continue serving everyone in the EU, the European Economic Area and Switzerland,” says the statement from Goal. “In its ruling, the CJEU expressly recognized that a subscription model, such as the one we advertise, is a valid form of consent for an advertising-financed service.” Meta executives transmitted this plan in September to the data protection authority of Ireland, the country where the technology giant has its European headquarters, and to the competition authorities in Brussels.
The measure is similar to what Elon Musk, owner of X, is considering implementing on his social network. Although, in the case of the old Twitter, the reason for demanding payment in exchange for use would be to combat the army of bots that inhabit the platform.
Meta’s approach seeks to address the requirements of the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), which aims to “put an end to unfair practices” by the giants of the digital economy. Meta is one of the six technological giants to which this regulation is directed, which subjects them to obligations such as having to facilitate interoperability or that users have the possibility of giving their consent (or not) before these platforms can exchange their data between services of the same company (for example between Facebook and WhatsApp).
Meta’s business model lives precisely by processing and exploiting this data: “We believe in an Internet based on advertising, which gives people access to personalized products and services regardless of their economic situation. It also allows small businesses to reach potential customers, grow their businesses and create new markets, driving the growth of the European economy,” says Meta in her statement. The detailed knowledge it has of the digital activity of each of its users is very valuable for advertisers, who pay to be able to reach very specific and limited profiles.
Meta estimates that its revenue in Europe amounted to about 17.07 euros per Facebook user in the second quarter of the year, or about 5.73 euros per month on average per user across all its applications. The subscription plan has similar rates.
The American company has several legal fronts open in Europe. The Irish data regulator imposed a fine of €1.2 billion in May, the largest in history, for violating privacy regulations. In February 2022, the company threatened to take Facebook and Instagram out of Europe if Brussels forced it to have to host data on European citizens in community territory.
You can follow EL PAÍS Technology in Facebook and x or sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter.
#Meta #offer #subscriptions #Europe #Instagram #Facebook #ads
