Facebook Charging a pretty penny of $100 to Send Message to Mark Zuckerberg

We knew Facebook was eager for new revenue streams. We just didn't know they were this eager.

If you try to send founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg a message on Facebook, Mashable discovered Thursday, the social network may offer to keep the message out of his "Other" Inbox — for a cool $100.

It appears  that users only get this message if they're not one of Zuck's 16 million followers. That, however, could still be coincidental.

Keen Facebook observers will recognize this as a variant on the $1 pay-to-message plan that the social network has been experimenting with for months. The company indicated at the time that it would be experimenting with other prices, so it's possible we're starting to see the fruits of that.

There were sporadic reports in December of Facebook charging various people $100 for the service, but this is the first time we've seen it — and certainly the first time we've seen it applied to the founder.

The "Other" inbox is Facebook's dumping ground for all messages it guesses you won't want to read urgently. It's been controversial for some time, as most users are entirely unaware of its existence — and many have been known to discover messages they really wish they'd read at the time, such as job offers.

If users are not connected to Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook, they may be charged $100 to send a message to the CEOs inbox instead of having it sent to the 'other' folder in his messages.

Facebook has been ramping up its efforts to create new revenue streams and one way they are doing this is by offering users more paid services, like its paid messaging system, which is still in testing.


Basically, the service allows users to pay Facebook a fee to send a message directly to the inbox of a person they are not connected with on Facebook. If a user wants to avoid a fee, the message will be sent to the recipient's 'other' folder in their messages.


Facebook launched the trial service last month and originally said that it would charge $1 to route messages to strangers' inbox. It's unclear why the social media giant is now charging some people an increased fee of $100 to direct a message to Zuckerberg's inbox.