The Heavy Cost of 'Free' Social Media

Social Media has been around for almost 20 years and today billions use it on a daily basis. Soon, however, all of us will need to decide whether to continue paying for 'free' services by providing unending amounts of personal data or pay upfront for better services that do not exploit our privacy for commercial gain.

When we use data-driven social networks we feed these platforms information regarding our identities, personal relationships, and experiences - this meta-data is than used to bombard each of us with unrelenting, user-specific advertising with uncanny precision. For example, Facebook, despite its denials to the contrary, focuses not on creating a community of users but in developing an ever more efficient advertising/marketing platform.

Consumers are recognizing that there is great value in obtaining 'real' news that is well-researched, fact-checked, and truthful - and are willing to pay for this vs. getting 'fake' news, unverified press releases, and click-bait.  This situation will force people to migrate to quality services and give rise to new, smaller fee-based social networks rather than those that collect our personal data, use it, and provide us nothing of value in return.

It was only a short-time ago when the experts said consumers would never pay for music or streaming movies, but people have demonstrated that they are willing to pay for quality 'experience'.  I believe, at this point in time, consumers are willing to pay a little to get access to sites and services that aren't awash with bots, fake news and antisocial behavior.

People are waking up to the heavy cost of 'free' social media. It's time for us to recognize this and move to more beneficial and useful ways of using the power of the internet.

Jim Lavorato, Founder & Principal

Fund-House Ventures, LLC
fundhouse.us