I had turned targeted ads off, on Facebook and Instagram. I still got ads but they were not targeted based on my data. I could live with that
Today I got a popup requiring me to pick an option of either accepting targeted ads or pay the equivalent of €13/$14 for an addfree experience across all meta platforms.
The statement reads well, and I’ll take them at their word, but if an algorithm exists to show you “relevant” content, they’re collecting data and using it keep you on the platform.
This has been my issue with ‘social media’ for the past ten(?) years. As soon as Instagram switch the default from chronological to what it thinks you want to see, it’s continued to be more and more shitified (so much that I no longer use it).
The beauty of the early days of social media was that it was real-time. I could see who was doing what right now. I could see what establishments were hosting events tonight. Instead, these platforms decided it was more to their benefit to show posts it thinks will keep you on the platform longer - to show you more ads. For me, this lead to finding out days later that things have happened I would have like to have done.
Wall Street run Social Media is garbage. Businesses, organizations, governments, etc., need to go back to publishing content on their own websites (or the Fediverse) and enabling RSS feeds.
