In this monologue, Kabir Dottor Chatterjee warns viewers that major social platforms are moving away from free access. He explains Meta’s upcoming two‑tier service that will charge $11.99‑$14.99 per month for verification, a blue badge, personalized protection, and direct customer support, effectively making free accounts second‑class citizens. He also references Twitter’s paid blue‑tick model under Elon Musk. Chatterjee critiques the growing dependency on social media, describing how constant notifications cause stress, replace real friendships with virtual ones, and dominate daily routines. While acknowledging the positive role of platforms in spreading awareness, activism, and global communication, he argues that the monetisation threatens these benefits. He urges a return to offline activities—reading books, listening to radio, visiting libraries, and cultivating real‑world relationships—as a healthier alternative. He hints at a forthcoming video on AI’s encroachment on privacy and invites audience interaction through comments and subscriptions.
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Stop, stop, stop! Don't go anywhere because you will not be able to go anywhere in a few days' time. Watch this video why I'm telling you this. So welcome to Frontline and Chai, guys. Cheers with a cup of chai. My name is Kabir Dottor Chatterjee. I haven't—I've never introduced myself. Okay, so here's cheers to the next video that you're going to watch. You're there with your chai. So this video is sadly for all those people who are so hellbent on social media. It won't be free anymore. Let us mourn this day and let us try to understand what— how are you going to live without social media? The inevitable is happening. This is coming a whole full circle, and I wanted to notify you from before. LinkedIn was always never free. So it always like there was a free account and then there was a premium account. So we never expected anything from it, right? Suddenly Twitter, with Elon Musk joining, Twitter has become you have to it gives a blue tick to all those who have paid like eight dollars ninety-nine cents. For all those who are monthly subscribers, so it gives a blue tick, which is like an authentic critique. It means you are an authentic person. Okay, so that okay, all the bots are all blue tick and they are all authentic people. So fine, we we we get it there. Okay, Elon Musk was doing a lot of things on Mars, and I was really happy that he's taking the like he's taking us to the Carter ships. Scale number two is probably going to we are going to all I'll be able to go to Mars at least people see people going to Mars in my lifetime. But there came his idea of buying the Twitter for God knows what reason, and suddenly everything has gone. He's made Twitter in such a way that you have to see his post whether you follow him or not. In the beginning, you have to see his post. So it's like Twitter. You have to if you have the blue tick on Twitter, you are you are considered a very privileged person. You know the kind of privilege, the kind of privileges we had in our days when we had a lot of money and so now Twitter has started with eight dollars. Now we come to the main point. Facebook is not going to be free anymore. Look at the screen. Facebook has quietly removed its free and always will be that slogan. It has changed to sign up page. It will quick and easy. Now here's the news. Okay, like Twitter, Meta, the Facebook parent company which has taken over Facebook, is starting to give you a two-tier service soon. As per national Post. I subscribe to National Post, which is very odd in this scenario of e-concept of e-news and getting news on Google and in Shorts. I actually subscribe to a newspaper. So according to that newspaper, Meta is going to start giving you 2-tier service soon. And as per National Post dated February 24th, 2023, at the cost of between US$11.99 to US$14.99, which is $15 a month. Meta Verified Subscribers will get a service that lets you verify your account with a government ID, get a blue badge, and extra personalization protection against accounts claiming to be you. Okay, and it has direct access to customer support, which means it's giving you a lot of benefits, which means if you do not subscribe to Facebook subscription account, you do not get these benefits. So Facebook is not liable if your account gets hacked, which means in other words, we are going to be treated as second-class citizens of Facebook world because if you pay You are the first-class citizen. You are, you are, you are. It will be explained. You are, you are an answer. If you are not, if you're just a free account holder, you're just having free food. So what do we do, guys? All those who have been born, like Facebook started in 1984, I think. So all those who were born, the people like The teenagers now who have only lived in the Facebook era, they don't know anything other than Facebook. You wake up in the morning, you first thing you switch on is Facebook and go through the notifications, go scroll through the timeline. Like, when— what are you going to do about it? Do you think? Did you think? So over the last 15 years, It has only been about social media that has kind of surrounded our lives. Okay, it's now AI which is surrounding our lives. It's another— I'm going to make another video on AI encroaching into our privacy very soon, so watch out for that. Now people stop reading books, people stop listening to songs, going to theaters, going to watching good films, even writing. Like Songs, hanging out, watching good, watching good films. Okay, it was Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit from the time you wake up till you fall asleep. Even before you are sleeping, you are running through the timelines to see if you've missed something. Even when you wake up in the middle of the night, you are switching on Facebook and you know like going through the timeline to see if you missed something. Guys, if you miss something, it's gone. It doesn't matter. Nobody cares about you missing it. Nobody cares. It's only your stress. It's over here. It's in your head. And your phone is constantly beeping. You're constantly on social media. You have no real friends. Only all your friends are virtual. You have 6,000 friends. All of them virtual. Do you have one friend on whose shoulder you can cry? One friend you can who you can share your deepest problems with? People have only virtual relations. People have met through social media, married, had babies, and those babies are probably in high school now. Just imagine. People have used social media to transform the world. There's been a lot of good things about social media also. People have used social media to transform. From the world, to communicate across the world, to reach out things, reach out things that we never thought existed, you know, like news and news from the remotest corner of the earth. Some things which are happening which are not good, which people should know, like the war and genital mutilation, dowry, bride burning, you know, girls, women, exploitation of women. These all have been shared on social media and people have become aware, very much aware. The world has been— there's been a whole new transformation in the world with social media. That is very true. People have raised revolutions through Facebook. Okay, and now we all have to pay a monthly fee for it. That's what Facebook has done. Facebook Does not know the responsibility it has in the society. It wants to earn money. Of course, it wants to earn more money, get more rich, get richer. I'm sorry, I'm forgetting my grammar. All because Elon Musk thought he could become more richer. Like he's the richest person in the world. He wants to become the more richer, richer, richer, richer. Just like how much money can you? Have in one lifetime before you say no? How much money do you need in a lifetime, Mr. Musk? How much money do you need in a lifetime, Mr. Zuckerberg, to say it's enough? So look at the reach of Facebook. Life on planet Earth has been surviving on Facebook for the past 20 years. Why just life? People have died on Facebook. They've died live on Facebook. They've committed suicide live on Facebook. And you think your responsibility is just about collecting ads? You think your responsibility towards humanity is just about collecting their data? Man, you are seriously misguided, Facebook and Twitter and social media. What about you guys? Are you willing to pay the monthly subscription rates for the basic necessity of your life? Of course. Social media is the basic necessity of your life, so that you took for granted for so many years. You were— do you know how to live without social media? I have a feeling we need to get back to the basics once more and find out what life really is all about. You know, once we switch off the social media, like I have removed Facebook from my phone so that, you know, it doesn't interact with my daily kind of— when I want to go to Facebook, I go there once or twice a week, maybe seeing everything. I remember Rekha once said, you know, the glamorous Rekha of Hindi movies, Bollywood movies, she once said, if I don't check on the news, it won't change. If there is a house burning somewhere, if there's a girl getting raped somewhere, It won't change because I didn't check the news. The only thing that will happen is I will get more stressed. I will get more stressed. And I, I need— I don't need to know every news that is happening on the globe. I don't need to know what— where everybody went on a holiday. So now what? We may have to get back to real friends. And real hangouts, and real library, and real music. Like play real music, or get back to radio. Radio days when the radio would be just going on the whole day, and you don't need to really listen to it, but you get a lot of information, you know, subconscious information, you know, in the background. You hear a lot of music which you don't have to decide and play that music, particular music. You can just Let it go, and you can do so many things, other things. Because you never know, one day Google might get greedy, and what happens to our library? What happens to the internet? Google might start charging money for the free information that it gives you. What happens then? Take care, guys. Check out, watch out for a life without social media. I am beginning to see a new world together. More like our old world is getting revived now. I feel very happy about it, with libraries and books and real friends and newspapers and hangouts and the world buzzing with activities. You know, I'm looking forward to it. That's the way we lived life. That's the way we woke up with the sound of the radio and sound of People, generally people hanging around. It's it's a different life altogether. Maybe we we need to go back and complete the full circle. Maybe social media will just be there for you to take check out whenever you feel lonely or you have a it's like one of the books or the newspaper, the TV or YouTube channel. You just check out whenever you're feeling lonely. I think so. We need to get ready for that kind of a world. Maybe. What do you think, guys? Have I missed out on anything? Please comment below. I will, I will definitely respond to your comments. I always take time out to respond to your comments. Please comment below and check out my next video here, and check out the video where I speak about how we lived our lives, our days without social media. Or even internet, or even computers. We didn't have anything— smartphone, computers, social media, internet. So how we lived? We didn't even have mobile phones. Check out, it's not a very difficult thing to do. It's not very difficult. Check out that video and you will definitely know, not feel so helpless. Okay, bye-bye. You take care and subscribe to share if you like this video. Keep sharing with all your friends. Okay, everybody needs to know. Bye bye. Take care.
