Surprise! Facebook Home will have ads, eventually

By Francis Bea April 5, 2013

Facebook, Facebook Exchange, Facebook Home, Facebook Cover Feed — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Facebook Home won’t come with ads when it launches April 12 … don’t get too comfortable though. When asked about advertising, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was quoted saying “there are no ads in this yet. I’m sure at some point there will be.”

Where exactly will Facebook Home run ads? On the Cover Feed, according to early reports. The Cover Feed, to jump start your memory, is the full blown picture and status feed that takes up the entire screen once you’ve installed Facebook Home. So if photos are a core feature on Facebook Home, you can expect that likewise full ads will probably be swipeable and take up the entire home screen. Of course there are many ways to be creative with advertising on Cover Feed, which Facebook is likely quite aware of already.

Recommended Videos

Question: “We may see ads in cover feed?” Zuckerberg: “Yup!”Sign me up!

— John Gruber (@gruber) April 4, 2013

If you’re bold enough to download Home and have Facebook run on top of your Android device 24/7, expect to have Facebook pry into your every activity on your mobile device. It sounds creepy, we know. But if you’re willing to turn your phone into a fully-optimized Facebook system, then you probably deserve the targeted ads that Facebook serves you.

Full screen ads or no, if Facebook sticks to its current design, this content could be photo-based and native to the browsing experience. The idea is to be as non-interrupting of the user as possible, although Facebook has struggled with mobile advertising in general.

There’s more reason for concern, too. News Feeds are started to feel devoted solely to Sponsored Posts, Suggested Pages, Mobile App Installs, and other types of sponsored ad units that didn’t require Facebook to drop a cookie in your browser and watch you surf the Web. These ad modules are actually independent of Facebook Exchange, which is what’s responsible for the banner ads on the right side of your Facebook profile.

But that’s about to change as for the first time Facebook Exchange ads will make it into the News Feed. And next … the Facebook Home ad units? It’s possible, dare we say likely?

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Francis got his first taste of the tech industry in a failed attempt at a startup during his time as a student at the…

Social Media

I paid Meta to ‘verify’ me — here’s what actually happened

In the fall of 2023 I decided to do a little experiment in the height of the “blue check” hysteria. Twitter had shifted from verifying accounts based (more or less) on merit or importance and instead would let users pay for a blue checkmark. That obviously went (and still goes) badly. Meanwhile, Meta opened its own verification service earlier in the year, called Meta Verified.

Mostly aimed at “creators,” Meta Verified costs $15 a month and helps you “establish your account authenticity and help[s] your community know it’s the real us with a verified badge." It also gives you “proactive account protection” to help fight impersonation by (in part) requiring you to use two-factor authentication. You’ll also get direct account support “from a real person,” and exclusive features like stickers and stars.

Computing

Here’s how to delete your YouTube account on any device

How to delete your YouTube account

Wanting to get out of the YouTube business? If you want to delete your YouTube account, all you need to do is go to your YouTube Studio page, go to the Advanced Settings, and follow the section that will guide you to permanently delete your account. If you need help with these steps, or want to do so on a platform that isn't your computer, you can follow the steps below.

Note that the following steps will delete your YouTube channel, not your associated Google account.

Mobile

How to download Instagram photos for free

Instagram app running on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5.

Instagram is amazing, and many of us use it as a record of our lives — uploading the best bits of our trips, adventures, and notable moments. But sometimes you can lose the original files of those moments, leaving the Instagram copy as the only available one . While you may be happy to leave it up there, it's a lot more convenient to have another version of it downloaded onto your phone or computer. While downloading directly from Instagram can be tricky, there are ways around it. Here are a few easy ways to download Instagram photos.