Having set up a Facebook page for my novel (don’t worry, it’s in progress, I’m not plugging sales), I was wondering how much it actually cost to let Facebook, as they say, “promote” the page.  I clicked “Promote” to get to the nitty gritty, and the first thing that appeared was this warning:

“Facebook’s advertising tools might not work as expected when an ad blocker is enabled in a web browser. Turn off the ad blocker or add this web page’s URL as an exception so you can create ads without any problems. After you turn off the ad blocker, you’ll need to refresh your screen.”

“Create ads without any problems”? I loathe this kind of doublespeak. So much for social networking, where we have to pay to socialise. I imagine Facebook is a giant party where some get in for free, but others have to pay to stand around plugging their wares. I’m not selling anything. I just want people to read a draft of my novel.

So “Create ads without any problems”? except there are problems for people , like me, who don’t want adverts. I do have Ad Blocker installed. It would be hypocritical to pay Facebook to bombard users with Ads they don’t want, when I block Ads (and complain about them) myself.