Creators and publishers have long worried about Meta’s control over link visibility on Facebook, because Mark Zuckerberg is effectively the poster child for enshittification. Now, those concerns appear to be escalating, as the company is testing a new system that effectively puts link-sharing behind a paywall for certain creators.
Under the test, the number of links a creator can share on Facebook each month is tied directly to whether they are subscribed to Meta Verified. According to a screenshot shared by social media consultant Matt Navarra as captured by Engadget, some creators recently received a notification from Meta stating: "Certain Facebook profiles without Meta Verified, including yours, will be limited to sharing links in 2 organic posts per month."
In other words, non-paying creators may only be allowed to share links in two posts per month, unless they upgrade to Meta Verified. Because Facebook isn't even interested in taking you out to dinner anymore before bending you over.
A Meta spokesperson confirmed the experiment to Engadget, describing it as a "limited test to understand whether the ability to publish an increased volume of posts with links adds additional value for Meta Verified subscribers."
Navarra also commented on the possibility of being charged to post links in an interview with BBC, saying: "If you're a creator or a business, I think the message is essentially if Facebook is a part of your growth or traffic strategy, that access now has a price tag attached to it. And that's new in its explicitness, even if it's been the direction of travel for a while."
He continued: "For creators it reinforces a pretty brutal reality that Facebook is no longer a reliable traffic engine and Meta is increasingly nudging it away from people trying to use it as one."
The test currently affects an unspecified number of creators and pages using Facebook’s "professional mode." Meta says publishers are not impacted at this time, though the distinction may offer little comfort given how frequently tests evolve into permanent features. If expanded, this policy would signal a clear move toward "pay-to-play" distribution, where creators must subscribe simply to maintain the functionality that was once standard.
And really, at what point do we all decided to say "fuck it" and just suck up the switching costs? Facebook is the land of diminishing returns, though a limit on organic links would actually push that diminishment over into zero (or even the negatives), thereby completing the reduction into… well, a pile of shit.
