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Comment by SODaniel | Hacker News Reader

$100 to send, and how much to guarantee that young Mr. Zuck actually READS the message? :)

Why would he bother to read them? I certainly wouldn't read anything a random facebook user sent me. Let alone if my time was worth what his time is worth.

Besides, what of interest could he possibly be sent?

Because he's charging to send them. It's not nice charging $100 to send you a message and ignoring it.

In fact I think it works the other way around, and it's a very good idea. "If someone is willing to spend $100 to text me, they probably have a good reason to do it. Maybe it's worth reading..."

You're kidding, right?

"Dear Mark, I am writing because I have a great business opportunity for you... ...

...

... and that's why you should buy out my revenue-positive minimum viable product so we can pivot towards disrupting even greater markets in the social space.

Sincerely, Every startup in the world"

Yes. I'm sure it's a great idea and only the highest quality of spam will be sent his way. Please forgive my cynicism ;)

I would much rather prefer $100 per message spam than free to send spam.

As for a point of order, this wouldn't be considered spam anyway:

A message is Spam only if it is both Unsolicited and Bulk.

Unsolicited Email is normal email (examples: first contact enquiries, job enquiries, sales enquiries)

Bulk Email is normal email (examples: subscriber newsletters, customer communications, discussion lists)

http://www.spamhaus.org/consumer/definition/

Thanks for the entirely pedantic and useless correction. Assuredly you have heard "spam" used colloquially to refer to unwanted messages, and not just the narrow definition of "unsolicited bulk" email.

Have a nice day.

> It's not nice charging $100 to send you a message and ignoring it.

And god knows that a business guy like Zuck would never do anything that's not nice.

I definitely wouldn't call someone paying $100 to send him a message a random Facebook user. A certain type of Facebook user yes, but the randomness is coming from a very small segment of Facebook's overall audience.

Steve Jobs' one sentence (if even that) replies to people who sent him emails are a fun part of his legacy at Apple. Maybe Zuck is trying to strengthen his image as czar of Facebook, powerful but still social.

Linkedin Actually guarantees that they will read your message, or they will give your money back.

By read, means somebody clicked on that page?

By read they say that somebody read and decided not to respond. After somedays, they will give you your credit back.

How does linkedin know?

They guarantee that you will receive a response from an InMail within X days, or you get your InMail credit back.

I'm curious, how is this different from normal messages?

Edit: after thinking about it, I guess the fact you're paying to message someone would impress the recipient, thus enticing them to reply.

They call it 'InMail'. The difference is that the recipient has to make an action in the message, or your money returns. You have some InMails according to the plan you chose to pay.

You know, if LinkedIn sent a percentage of that money on to the user, I'd be more likely to read the recruiting spam.

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