It remains to be seen if the trial pleases advertisers – but it certainly does not appear to have gone down well with users.
One person on Threads called, external the move “bonkers” – adding that it “seems like an aggressively pushy move to earn more ad dollars for Meta”.
Others have raised the prospect of boycotting the platform.
“We will simply not be scrolling,” said, external one X (formerly Twitter) user.
Meta is not the first big tech firm to force people to watch adverts.
YouTube is known for showing non-skippable ads to users watching videos on its platform or TV app who do not pay for its ad-free premium tier.
Advertisers can target YouTube viewers with 15 to 30 second-long, non-skippable promotional videos that appear before, during or after other videos if they want people to view their entire message.
They can also advertise using similarly non-skippable “bumper ads” – shorter videos of up to six seconds long – on YouTube videos.
Some users have responded by turning to ad blocking tools and browser extensions as a way around adverts that interrupt videos on the platform.
Google, YouTube’s parent company, is in turn trying to clamp down on ad blockers.
However it is not clear that forcing users to watch more ads actually helps companies’ bottom lines.
A study carried out by TikTok, external, published in January, suggested forcing viewers to watch adverts might actually lead to less engagement.
More than 70% of its participants said they were more likely to engage with the experience of an advert if there was an option to skip it.
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