Facebook on Thursday said it's testing a new feature that'll allow users to send messages to strangers for a small fee. Why would anyone willingly fork over cash for such a thing? The move is clearly aimed at monetizing Facebook's infinitely corpulent social circus.
The company's immense popularity has lead to a narrow quagmire as it looks for ways to get a return from its users. Messages sent through Facebook currently get filed in an Inbox folder, similar to email or any other communication service. But messages sent from someone that isn't your friend get put away in an Other folder, which not many people realize is there. The pay-per-message system would file sent messages into the recipient's Inbox, ensuring that at the very least they see it.
New filters are also being implemented to give users better control over what gets through and what does not. There are two options: Basic Filtering and Strict Filtering. Basic Filtering allows messages from friends and even friends of friends to get through, while Strict Filtering only lets messages sent from friends in your Inbox.
The pay-per-message feature is limited and still in testing, so it might not even become a real thing. Still, the social network said the feature is also meant to cut down on spammers—people receive spam on Facebook?—so who knows? Maybe we will see it implemented Facebook-wide sometime next year.
