Private social network Path announced today that it is launching a premium subscription service alongside the ability to share posts to a private group of friends, as well as a private channel through Path 3.2. It has also partnered with Deutsche Telekom to offer its customers free access to all of Path’s extra features for a year. If you’re having a hard time getting your head around this, don’t worry, you’re not alone, read on for explanation.
As the company has said in the past, a premium or a subscription service is something that it has been working on to be launched in the second quarter of this year. Thanks to the emergence of the sticker economy, Path has been able to monetize earlier than it expected and in a more significant manner.
Path’s membership numbers have also grown significantly over the last six months. Back in March, it recorded six million registered users, which doubled in June, before announcing today that it now has 20 million users. Whether through Facebook fatigue or through its own merit, Path’s growth is looking very healthy this year which will go a long way in pushing its revenue generation as well as closing partnership deals.
The long awaited premium subscription service is said to provide early and all encompassing access to stickers and photo filters. In other words, rather than having to buy all of the extras for up to USD 1.99 a pop, Path users be able to get all the stickers and filters they want for USD 14.99 per year.
For iOS users, Path also offers a three month subscription offer for USD 4.99 while for Android users, the company has a monthly $1.99 subscription. Clearly this is for those who aren’t ready for a longer term commitment. Path currently offers 32 paid sticker packs for $1.99 each and nine extra photo and video filters for $0.99 each. Between paying $15 a year vs $75 one time payment for all of the extras? That sounds like a no brainer to us.
The company also warns that all the paid features will not carry over across platforms. In other words, if you purchased your premium items or subscription on Android, they will not be there if you switch to iOS, and vice versa. Presumably the same will also apply when it introduces its Windows Phone version. In short, paid items remain on the platform your purchased them on. [Update] According to Path’s support section, subscriptions will be tied to user accounts and will be carried over across platforms but individual purchases are tied to each platform and are permanently accessible.
In Path 3.2, the company will also be introducing more private sharing options, as if Path isn’t private already. Currently Path users are able to share posts in two ways, “publicly”, meaning available for everyone you’re friends with on Path, or “privately” which is exclusive just for your eyes only.
The new private sharing feature allows Path users to share certain posts with selected people so everyone else won’t have access to it. Privately shared moments are marked with a padlock icon instead of the usual smiling face.
Path is also introducing Inner Circle, a more permanent private group. People can choose their most trusted friends among their 150 to be included in the Inner Circle. You cannot add people to your Inner Circle if you’re not already friends. Posts for the Inner Circle as well as members of the circle will be marked with a star so you can immediately tell which among them are your very special friends. You will also be able to filter the Inner Circle stream by tapping on the white star at the bottom of the cover photo so you don’t get mixed up between the two.
Posts marked with a padlock or a star cannot be reshared, although there’s nothing stopping anyone from taking a screenshot of them.
Unfortunately this version of Path has yet to add the ability to untag yourself from unwanted posts or to mute notifications of further comments to a post if you no longer wish to be notified of them.
[Update -17 Sept] Path 3.2 is now finally available for iOS, you can subscribe to use the early access sticker packs along with all the other premium features
The wait is over! Path 3.2 with Premium, Private Sharing, and Inner Circle is now in the App Store. Thank you for your patience and enjoy!
— Path (@path) September 16, 2013