Biz Stone, the co-founder of Twitter, has a few suggestions for Mark Zuckerberg, his social media rival. In a blog post on Medium, Stone proposed a premium service for users that would be free of ads.
"The ads on Facebook don’t seem particularly useful or engaging. However, ads on the service are universally tolerated because that’s what makes Facebook free and free is nice," Stone wrote. "Anywhoo, now that I’m using it and thinking about it, I’ve got an idea for Facebook. They could offer Facebook Premium. For $10 a month, people who really love Facebook (and can afford it), could see no ads. Maybe some special features too. If 10% percent of Facebook signed up, that’s $1B a month in revenue. Not too shabby."
It's a nice thought, but one I doubt Zuck will seriously consider. While there is a devoted Facebook following, I don't see many users paying a monthly service fee—ads or no ads. Facebook's exponential growth has a lot to do with anyone being able to sign up for free.
As Mike Isaac at All Things D writes, "A funny thought, especially considering the concerns around monetizing Twitter with ads in its early days. The implication, I figure, is that if you want to include ads, they have to be relevant, well-targeted and unobtrusive."
[via All Things D]
