[wombat_trouble]

> “I am not a bot/intelligence services construct/foreign troll masquerading as an citizen etc.”. Is a pretty valuable service for the network.

It is valuable to Facebook to maintain a healthy pltform. But is it really worth $15 a month to you to broadcast this to others?

Unless the culture of the platform shifts to a point where non-verified accounts are considered second-class, the only reason to pay this is basically as a status symbol. In which case, I think the tiered approach makes more sense. And maybe "Facebook Gold" for people who want to pay even more for a badge....

Twitter had their checkmarks established as an artificially constrained status symbol you couldn't buy with money... and then, under Musk, they altered the terms of the deal by saying you have to pay, but you get tangible perks in terms of platform features, visibility of your content, etc. Unless Facebook wants to do that, I can't see people paying this much on their own...

[anonuser123456]

Personally, I wouldn’t pay Meta because their platform is already beyond salvageable IMO.

But in principle, I think networks should charge their users and provide services, and identity is the most-in-need service the internet lacks.

Will users pay for identity? Probably not, but one can dream.