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Facebook says it is experimenting with "extreme price points" for its new messaging feature to discourage spam.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney)
Want to message Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook? For $100, your note will land in his inbox.
Traditionally, if a Facebook user messages someone outside his or her network, the missive gets sent to the "Other" mailbox -- a rarely checked purgatory most users don't even know exists. It's a practice intended to protect users from a spam deluge.
Facebook said in December that it would begin testing out paid messages, allowing users to contact people with whom they have no direct connection in return for a fee. Facebook didn't say at the time how much it would cost, but the answer turns out to be "a lot."
Mashable discovered on Thursday that sending a message to Facebook founder Zuckerberg carries a $100 price tag. That's also what it costs to message Facebook COO Sheryl Sandburg , CFO David Ebersman, and several other Facebook members CNNMoney tried, such as Digg founder Kevin Rose.
"We are testing some extreme price points to see what works to filter spam," a Facebook representative told CNNMoney.
The messaging fee is one of several new revenue streams Facebook is testing out. The company has traditionally drawn most of its revenue from advertising sales, but its latest experiments explore generating cash directly from its 1 billion members.
Ahead of the holidays, Facebook(FB) launched "Facebook Gifts," allowing users to purchase real-world gifts for their Facebook friends. In October, the social network started testing out a "Promote" feature that lets users pay $7 to broadly broadcast important pictures or announcements.
France launched airstrikes Friday to help the government of Mali defeat al-Qaeda-linked militants who captured more ground this week.
BAMAKO, Mali (AP) — The battle to retake Mali's north from the al-Qaeda-linked groups controlling it began in earnest Saturday, after hundreds of French forces deployed to the country and began aerial bombardments to drive back the Islamic extremists.
At the same time, nations in West Africa authorized the immediate deployment of troops to Mali, fast-forwarding a military intervention that was not due to start until September.
The decision to begin the military operation was taken after the fighters, who seized the northern half of Mali nine months ago, decided earlier this week to push even further south to the town of Konna, coming within 50 kilometers (30 miles) of Mopti, the first town held by the government and a major base for the Malian military.
Many believe that if Mopti were to fall, the Islamists could potentially seize the rest of the country, dramatically raising the stakes. The potential outcome was "a terrorist state at the doorstep of France and Europe," French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Saturday.
France scrambled Mirage fighter jets from a base in neighboring Chad, as well as combat helicopters beginning the aerial assault on Friday. They have also sent in hundreds of troops to the front line, as well as to secure the capital. In just 24 hours, French forces succeeded in dispersing the Islamists from Konna, the town the fighters had seized in a bold advance earlier in the week, Le Drian said.
Malian military officials said they were now conducting sweeps, looking for snipers.
"A halting blow has been delivered, and heavy losses have been inflicted on our adversaries, but our mission is not complete," French President Francois Hollande said after a three-hour meeting with his defense chiefs in Paris. "I reiterate that it consists of preparing the deployment of an African intervention force to allow Mali to recover its territorial integrity."
However, in a sign of how hard the battle ahead may be, the extremists succeeded in shooting down a French helicopter, the defense minister confirmed. The pilot died of his wounds while he was being evacuated. The Islamists are using arms stolen from ex-Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's arsenal, as well as the weapons abandoned by Mali's military when they fled their posts in the face of the rebel advance.
They have outfitted SUVs with high-caliber machine guns, and have released videos displaying their collection of anti-aircraft weapons.
The Islamists have vowed to retaliate against French interests, and they claim to have sleeper cells in all of the capitals of the West African nations who are sending troops. Hollande announced that he had raised France's domestic terror threat level.
Online in jihadist forums, participants called for fighters to attack French interests in retaliation for the air raids. They discussed possible targets, including the French Embassy in neighboring Niger, one of the countries donating troops, according to a transcript provided by Washington-based SITE Intelligence.
The sudden military operation is a reversal of months of debate over whether or not Western powers should get involved in a military bid to oust the militants, who took advantage of a coup in Mali's capital in March to capture the north. As recently as December, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon cautioned against a quick military operation. Diplomats said that September would be the earliest the operation could take place.
All of that went out the window this week when the fighters pushed south from the town of Douentza, which demarcated their line of control, located 900 kilometers (540 miles) from the capital. By Thursday, they had succeeded in pushing another 120 kilometers (72 miles) south, bringing them nearly face-to-face with the ill-equipped and ill-trained Malian military in a showdown that couldn't be ignored by the international community.
In a statement released Saturday, the bloc representing nations in West Africa, ECOWAS, said they had authorized the immediate deployment of troops to Mali. ECOWAS Commission President Kadre Desire Ouedraogo said they made the decision "in light of the urgency of the situation."
In Washington, a U.S. official confirmed that the country has offered to send drones to Mali. The official could not be named because he wasn't authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
Lt. Col. Diarran Kone, a spokesman for Mali's defense minister, said on Saturday that he was at the Bamako airport to receive a contingent of French special forces from one of their tactical units. Residents in the town of Sevare, near the line of control, said they had seen planes of white people arriving, whom they assume were French soldiers.
Hundreds of French troops were involved in the operation, code-named "Serval" after a sub-Saharan wildcat, officials in Paris said.
"The situation in Mali is serious," Le Drian said in Paris. "It has rapidly worsened in the last few days … We had to react before it was too late," he added.
French intelligence services had detected preparations for what they described as a "major offensive" organized and coordinated by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, known as AQIM, and their allies against the towns of Mopti and Diabaly. After a large number of vehicles were spotted heading toward the strategic town on Thursday, France sent in its first unit to Sevare, a town adjacent to Mopti, to support the Malian combat forces, Le Drian said.
Then on Friday, Hollande authorized the use of French air power following an appeal from Mali's president. French pilots targeted a column of jihadist fighters travelling in pickup trucks, who were heading down toward Mopti from Konna. He said that the helicopter raid led to the destruction of several units of fighters and stopped their advance toward the city.
Overnight Saturday, air strikes began in the areas where the fighters operate, Le Drian said, led by French forces in Chad, where France has Mirage 2000 and Mirage F1 fighter jets stationed. Residents in the town of Lere, near the Mauritanian border, confirmed that it had been bombed.
Al-Qaeda's affiliate in Africa has been a shadowy presence for nearly a decade, operating out of Mali's lawless northern desert. They did not come out into the open until this April, when a coup by disgruntled soldiers in Bamako caused the country to tip into chaos. The extremists took advantage of the power vacuum, pushing into the main towns in the north, and seizing more than half of Mali's territory, an area larger than Afghanistan.
Turbaned fighters now control all the major northern cities, carrying out beatings, floggings and amputations in public squares just as the Taliban did.
European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso accept the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of Europe.
The prestigious award, given to the EU rather than an individual, has been collected by Herman Van Rompuy and Jose Manuel Barroso, the Union's two "presidents" to the sound of trumpet fanfares and in the presence of the Norwegian Royal Family at the award ceremony in Oslo's City Hall.
"Ich bin ein Europaer. Je suis fier d'etre europaen. I am proud to be European," said Mr Van Rompuy, the president of the European Council, the regular summits of EU leaders, in his acceptance speech.
European Commission President Mr Barroso used the platform to emphasise the need to tackle the bloody crisis in Syria.
"As a community of nations that has overcome war and fought totalitarianism, we will always stand by those who are in pursuit of peace and human dignity," he said.
"And let me say it from here today: the current situation in Syria is a stain on the world's conscience, and the international community has a moral duty to address it."
UPDATE EU Summit: Van Rompuy's new proposal - more radical than before, pushes for EU budget cut by E200 bln. President Basescu calls for significant rise of direct payments to Romania farmers
Romanian President Traian Basescu has demanded "imperatively" a significant rise in allocations for direct payments to Romanian farmers, during his talks with European Council president Herman Van Rompuy on Thursday, European sources told HotNews.ro. The talks come as EU leaders start marathon talks in an attempt to reach a compromise on the EU's 2014-2020 budget, with Germany and others saying they would not dismiss the possibility of failure.
UPDATE A new proposal pushed by Herman Van Rompuy is even more radical than the previous one, which called for an E80 billion cut. European sources told HotNews.ro that the head of the European Council has now proposed a EU budget cut of E200 billion - the amount demanded by Britain. The reduction would be applied to European Commission proposed budget of E1,047 billion.
The Romanian head of state - who on Wednesday said he was cautiously optimistic about the summit, but would not dismiss any result - is aiming at a rise of payment per hectare by at least 50% as compared to the current level, according to sources. This comes as EU member states with major contributions to the EU budget have been calling for cuts in subsidies.
The Basescu-Van Rompuy meeting came in preparation for the European Council talks due to start Thursday evening. The meeting was joined by European Commission President Jose Barroso.
Romanian government presents program: Average economic growth of 3% in 2013-2016, budget deficit below 3%
The newly designated government of Romania, formed of the Social Liberal Union (USL) alliance and led by Victor Ponta, eyes an average annual economic growth of 3% for 2013-2016 and maintaining an ESA-system budget deficit of under 3% until 2016, according to the USL governing program, published by the government on Thursday.
It eyes reaching a structural budget deficit of 0.7% of GDP in 2014 and keeping it at that level in 2015 and 2016, but also reaching a "lower VAT level for basic food products within the limits of fiscal necessities" on the average term.
On research, the government wants to group all research institutions controlled by ministers and governmental agencies under the Education, Research and Innovation ministry.
On European funds, the Government eyes an absorption rate for non-reimbursable structural and cohesion funds of 50-80% by 2015.
On fiscal policies, the government says it plans to provide transparency for public funds, to simplify the tax system, to return to a 19% VAT and introduce progressive taxation.
The program defines the principles of the USL government. Among them:
compliance with the rule of law and individual rights
compliance with Romania's commitments to foreign partners - the European Commission, the IMF and th World Bank - with the goal of an inclusive economic growth with a balance distribution among the population, by applying structural reforms which would allow increasing economic competitiveness.
a new vision for Romania - economic development and social cohesion
improving the absorption rate of structural funds as an essential condition to provide sustainable economic growth and limit foreign debt
support economic freedom, private initiative and fair competition
guarantee property rights
efficient use of public money and war on tax dodgers
accelerated structural reforms
the development of competitive economy, of modern agriculture and industry
sustainable social policies to provide free and equal access to education and health systems
political reform, meaning an improved Constitution and a credible, legitimate Parliament
regain the country's place worldwide as a respected partner within the European Union
