Facebook to let developers charge subscriptions

View of the Facebook homepage taken in Washington on May 6, 2012.

/ NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/GettyImages

(CBS/AP) No, Facebook is not charging a membership fee. The social network is letting app developers charge subscription fees, however, in addition to existing one-time payments, for games and other applications on its site.

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Facebook Inc. said on its developer blog that the subscription feature will be available in July. The changes open up a new revenue stream for developers as well as for Facebook, which takes a 30 percent cut from all payments on its site.

"With subscriptions, [developers] can establish a recurring revenue stream and offer updated content or premium experiences for a monthly fee," Prashant Fuloria, Facebook product management director, said in a blog post.

People will still able to make payments on a one-time basis.

Facebook is also replacing its own Credits currency with users' local currency. So U.S. users will pay in dollars and those in Japan will pay in yen.

Payments for virtual items, such as chips on "Zynga Poker," accounted for 17 percent of Facebook's revenue in the first quarter.