Municipal officials in the ancient Italian port city of Venice began charging selfie-stick holders a €5 admission fee on Thursday, finally profiting directly from the sunglasses-wearing, Instagramming invaders for trampling the town’s rich cultural heritage, Sky News reports.
Non selfie-stick-holders are being charged as well. “We need to find a new balance between the tourists and residents,” said the city’s top tourism official, Simone Venturini, adding “We need to safeguard the spaces of the residents, of course, and we need to discourage the arrival of day-trippers on some particular days.” Sky News’s article describes the selfie-stick people as “angry” over being charged a nominal fee to Instagram themselves in and around important sites.