The basic bargain accepted by planet Earth’s few billion social-media users for the last few decades has been that, in exchange for use of a free product, they will be monetized, mostly through the sale of ads. Meta has made the most of anyone out of this deal, starting with Facebook and extending the concept with Instagram. Soon, it will probably become the largest digital advertising company in the world, finally unseating Google.

In recent years, though, social-media companies have been wondering if they might adjust that bargain a bit. Taking a cue from omni-monetized platforms like LinkedIn, Elon Musk’s X shifted to a subscription model that limits messaging and posting visibility for people who don’t pay; meanwhile, purer messaging apps, like WhatsApp, have been experimenting with ways to charge people, too. After building one of the largest businesses in the world by giving away its core product, Meta has started fiddling with subscription plans as well, with plans to test them on almost every service it offers. From TechCrunch:

WhatsApp is testing a new subscription tier, similar to Instagram Plus and Snapchat , that lets users pay for customized icons, themes, ringtones, and more. The paid plan’s features are largely cosmetic; users........

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