Trial charge for messages to people outside users' social circle, from 71p for Robert Peston to £10.68 for Tom Daley
Facebook users could pay £10.68 to contact Tom Daley. Photograph: Peter Tarry/NOPP
Facebook has started charging UK users up to £11 to send
messages to celebrities and other people outside their circle of
friends.
It has just launched a test scheme in the UK with
fees ranging from as much as £10.68 to contact a celebrity such as
Olympic swimmer Tom Daley.
It costs a standard 71p to
contact less well-known figures, such as BBC's Robert Peston or Prince
Harry's girlfriend Cressida Bonas, who do not have an official army of
fans or followers.
Facebook confirmed the experiment but said it did not know yet whether it would be implement across the social network.
"It
is being tested among a very small percentage of users," said a
spokeswoman. "There is no set timescale. It depends on what happens,
what feedback we get as to whether it is rolled out nationally. We are
testing a number of price points in the UK and other countries to
establish the optimal fee that signals importance. This is still a test
and these prices are not set in stone."
Facebook has been
trialling charging at its US operation since December. The trial has now
been extended to a further 36 countries, including the UK.
Facebook
said the charging fee structure varied according to a number of factors
including the number of followers and a secret "fame" algorithm.
The
vast majority of users in the UK can still send messages to strangers
for free, but those involved in the test can see the fee scale ranges
from the £10.68 for a household name such as Daley to £10.08 to contact
author Salman Rushdie.
Others such as comedian Miranda
Hart, culture secretary Jeremy Hunt and comedian Bill Bailey are all in
the 71p standard price bracket.
The launch of
the charging feature will be controversial. Facebook said it was a way
of inhibiting spamming for famous people as paid-for messages go
straight to the recipient's inbox rather than the "other" folder which
receives all communication from people outside a user's circle of
friends.
In January, Facebook was ridiculed for setting a
$100 (£61) fee to contact founder Mark Zuckerberg. He has previously
said he would like Facebook messaging to become an alternative to email.
The network rolled out @facebook.com email addresses to all users last
June.
Iain Mackenzie, a spokesman for Facebook Europe, said the charging structure should not be mistaken for a fame barometer.
"There's not a sliding scale based on fame. You can't infer someone's level of 'celebrity' from the numbers," he said.
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
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