A big issue with paid subscriptions is that it dilutes the strength of the ad network, since you're specifically excluding desirable target customers.

I think that argument is aging fast; it dates from before ad blockers were the increasingly big deal they are now.

You've got two basic choices with a user who has demonstrated their passion to remove ads, spend money to play an arms-game race with the ad blockers to pound through their defenses, or directly make money from that passion, possibly an order-of-magnitude more money per user.

Is it really so obvious that the arms race is the correct solution?

If I were a major shareholder of Facebook, I would be asking this question in a pointed manner. There's an argument to be made that they're leaving billions on the table here, and the argument is getting better every month that goes by.

There is another basic choice: write a code that is intentionally incompatible with ad blockers.

They can name an important navigation element "ad", so ad blocker will hide it for example. Then, when a bunch of users start complaining that the website does not work, point out that it's all ad blocker's fault (because without it everything works).

I've seen a few precedents already.

I'm happy to continue to modify my ad blocker until it allows me to use enough of facebook to be happy. How I choose to render the data Facebook sends me, is up to me.

While I think that this is a very bad idea, one could dynamically name them in a defective way. The relevant information (blocking lists) are openly available.

This just demands a new strategy for blocking.

That works for small websites, but big sites will simply have exceptions listed.

<evil-mode> I'd imagine you - by which I mean morally void publishing execs - take money for reduced ads and then charge a premium for reaching the people who are paying to remove ads.

Even better, form an ad blocker company, get successful, and charge large advertisers for white listing their ads. https://adblockplus.org/acceptable-ads-agreements

I wouldn't be surprised if many of those desirable customers are also the ones using ad blockers.

Presumably because it rather directly puts the question of just how much the use of Facebook is worth into user's minds. Compared to alternative monetization schemes it's limited and sticky.

How much does Facebook receive for the ads they display on my page?

If they are making $10 dollars a year, then charge me $10. Up to me. I can get it for free with ads, or pay without.

Facebook might even be okay with that, because they'll be making the same amount of $$ and could potentially charge you a premium. But it will be hard for Facebook to sell it's advertising customers on a reduced pool of eyeballs; and I bet statistically people willing to pony up $10 to avoid ads are also likely to buy the products advertised on Facebook (i.e., I think people like you or I and many others on this site are outside the norm).

Fair point.

Even if FB were to try this, I don't think people would trust that their information is not being used for other (devious) purposes or that there wouldn't be some ads in the future even with the payments coming in. Trust has to be earned, and FB, in my opinion, has dug itself into a deep hole on that front.

The only reasons I see some people who're concerned about privacy using FB are because there is no better alternative and it's hard to move your network out, even if it's only for specific circles of people in your life.

I think they're holding out hope that they can continue to grow revenue through advances in adtech when their subscriber numbers hit the inevitable plateau. Even offering an ad-free subscription option would eat into their ad platform, and Netflix has recently demonstrated how tough it is to raise the price of a subscription (or expire a years-old discounted rate). With ads, they can at least hope to grow per-user revenue in the future.

We're building this at Publir and it's working nicely in early testing. Feel free to ping me if you are curious for the data.

yep- and let me keep my privacy too. FB makes about $1 per person per month in revenue. I would pay more. The "free" tier is maybe good for those situations where the user can't afford it.

Oh well, I've been suggesting this for a long time to no avail.