It appears that Meta is moving in the paid models direction, as the company rolls out its new Meta Verified service(Opens in a new tab).
The news came after the company sent out a premature message(Opens in a new tab) announcing its new business offering to Instagram users, involving a monthly paid service that verifies your identity, provides account holders with a coveted blue badge and reportedly monitors the site for impersonators.
Not long after, the official news was posted to followers of the new Meta broadcast channel by CEO Mark Zuckerberg himself, who wrote:
This week we’re starting to roll out Meta Verified — a subscription service that lets you verify your account with a government ID, get a blue badge, get extra impersonation protection against accounts claiming to be you, and get direct access to customer support. This new feature is about increasing authenticity and security across our services.
Credit: Mark Zuckerberg / Instagram
In order to sign up for Meta Verification, users need to meet the “minimum activity requirement,” be at least 18 years of age or older and must submit a form of government identification that matches the information on their respective Instagram or Facebook account. As The Verge(Opens in a new tab) reported, those who pay for Meta Verified will also get access to exclusive content, like Reels and Stories stickers, as well as 100 free Facebook stars each month — stars can be used to virtually tip other creators.
The service is startlingly similar to the controversial Twitter Blue offering debuted by CEO Elon Musk, which was met with the ire of Twitter users and official accounts near and far. But Meta contends that its paid model is different, an addition to its current account services across platforms that won’t touch current verified accounts that met the current “notability and authenticity” requirements.
At the same time, Meta continued revealing additional services that seem to be ushering in a new creator-forward era of its social platforms, including Instagram’s Broadcast Channels and Facebook’s new content moderation tools for creators seeking more control over their pages.
The Meta Verified service begins at $11.99 per month for desktop users or $14.99 per month for iOS, and will roll out to users in Australia and New Zealand first.