Facebook begins rollout of 'News Tab' in US

Facebook on Friday began rolling out its dedicated "News Tab" with professionally produced content, the latest move by the social network to promote journalism and shed its reputation as a platform for misinformation.

The news section will be separate from user's normal feeds and include articles from partner news organizations, with Facebook relying on both human curation and algorithmic "personalization."

Labeled Facebook News, the new tab "gives people more control over the stories they see, and the ability to explore a wider range of their news interests, directly within the Facebook app," said a Facebook statement.

The initiative is in line with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's call to promote "quality journalism" and help readers separate professional content from viral hoaxes.

"We talked to news organizations about what they'd like to see included in a news tab, how their stories should be presented and what analytics to provide," said Facebook vice president for news partnerships Campbell Brown and product manager Mona Sarantakos, Product Manager in a statement.

Earlier this week, Zuckerberg pointed to a "big announcement" on news and journalism and indicated the new feature would highlight "high quality news, not just social content."

Facebook is expected to pay some of the news organizations that will contribute to the News Tab but has yet to disclose full details.

The social network has partnered with some 200 news organizations including the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, CBS News, BuzzFeed, Fox News, the Boston Globe, Bloomberg and Vanity Fair.

Facebook said it would begin an initial test rollout which would "showcase local original reporting by surfacing local publications from the largest major metro areas across the country, beginning with New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Philadelphia, Houston, Washington DC, Miami, Atlanta and Boston."

source: news.abs-cbn.com

What does Facebook's plan to hire journalists mean for media industry?

NEW YORK -- Facebook's plan to hire professional journalists instead of relying solely on algorithms to deliver news is a positive step but is unlikely to shake up an embattled media industry, analysts say.

The social media giant said Tuesday it would build a small team of journalists to select the top national news of the day "to ensure we're highlighting the right stories."

It comes as the US media landscape is plagued by job losses and newspaper closures, with organizations trying to figure out how to record profits in the age of free news.

Stories will appear in a section called the "news tab," which will be separate from the traditional news feed that displays updates and content from users' friends and relatives.

"In theory I see this as a really positive development. It is something quite promising," Danna Young, a communications professor at the University of Delaware, told AFP.

Facebook's journalists will be curating stories from news sites and won't be editing headlines or writing content.

The California-based company has consistently said it does not want to be considered a media organization that makes major editorial decisions, and this announcement does little to change that, experts add.

"It's not transformative because it's not going to change necessarily the behavior of individuals who are referencing stories on their feeds," said Young.

"That's where the power comes from -- individuals you know and trust putting their tacit stamp of approval on stories by sharing them," she added.

'PERSONALIZED'

The tab will be the site's first news feature using human moderators since it shut down its ill-fated "trending topics" section last year after a scandal over allegations workers had suppressed stories about conservative issues.

Articles not deemed top news stories will still be collated using algorithms based on the user's history, such as pages they follow, publications they subscribe to and news they have already interacted with.

"Our goal with the news tab is to provide a personalized, highly relevant experience for people," Facebook head of news partnerships Campbell Brown told AFP in San Francisco Tuesday.

The news tab feature comes as Facebook embarks on a series of initiatives to boost journalism, with traditional media organizations accusing it of benefiting financially from their hard work.

Internet platforms are dominating the internet advertising space making it difficult for established news organizations to transition what were very profitable print advertisements online.

Facebook announced in January that it would invest $300 million over 3 years to support journalism, particularly local news organizations.

It has also funded fact-checking projects around the world, including one in partnership with AFP.

Facebook will reportedly pay some publishers to license news content for the tab but Mathew Ingram, who writes about digital media for the Columbia Journalism Review, doesn't expect that to trickle down to hard-up organizations that need it the most.

"The companies they are going to choose are ones already doing well I assume. It might give them a little extra cash but I don't see it driving a huge amount of traffic," he told AFP.

'DESTRUCTIVE'

Print journalism in the US is in free-fall as social media overtakes newspapers as the main news source for Americans.

Around 2,000 American newspapers closed in the past 15 years, according to the University of North Carolina, leaving millions of residents without reporters keeping track of what their local authorities are up to.

"The death of local news has such destructive effects for democracy. It's a complex issue that Facebook alone cannot fix," said Young.

The number of journalists working at US newspapers slumped by 47 percent from 2008 to 2018, according to a Pew Research Center survey released last year.

The total number of journalists in newsrooms fell by 25 percent, the group found, while consultancy firm Challenger Gray & Christmas says this is going to be the worst year for layoffs since 2009.

It's a difficult time for Stephen Groves, who recently earned a master's in journalism at New York University, to be looking for work. When he heard about Facebook's plans, he was skeptical.

"Facebook is not a journalism company and so before working for Facebook I would want to see their commitment to ethical, robust journalism," the 30-year-old told AFP.

The digital sector is also in trouble.

When Buzzfeed cut 200 jobs in January, 29-year-old Emily Tamkin was let go from a position she had held for just a few months.

"I'm personally not cheered by the fact that Facebook is swooping in and hiring journalists. If that's the silver lining then we have a very big cloud here," she told AFP.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Facebook dives deep into news with publisher deal

WASHINGTON - Facebook moved deeper into the media business Wednesday by crafting a deal with news publishers which allows the social network to deliver articles directly to readers.

The long-anticipated move by Facebook means it will host news items on its servers to give readers faster access.

The plan has been hotly debated in the news industry -- by those who argue it can help struggling media groups, and others who say news organizations will lose control of their content to the social network.

The new feature called Instant Articles "makes the reading experience as much as ten times faster than standard mobile web articles," Facebook said in a blog post on its website.

Sharing articles on Facebook's mobile app is growing but the average article takes about eight second to load, according to Facebook.

The nine partners in the launch are The New York Times, National Geographic, BuzzFeed, NBC, The Atlantic, The Guardian, BBC News, Spiegel and Bild, Facebook said.

Facebook said publishers will be able to sell advertisements in the articles and keep the revenue or use Facebook's ad network. Publishers will also be able to track traffic and other data of their content hosted by the social network.

Instant Articles will initially be available on the Facebook app for iPhone, but Facebook is working to expand the platform.

"As a lover of journalism, storytelling and mobile, I have high hopes for the positive impact Instant Articles will have on how we read, and share, the news," Facebook's news partnerships manager Liz Heron said of the plan.

- News juggernaut -

A recent Pew Research Center report found some 30 percent of Americans get at least some of their news from Facebook.

But media groups have been struggling with the shift to digital from print, both in terms of delivering relevant articles to readers and in getting ad revenue from their online services.

Some in the news industry argue the plan gives Facebook too much control of the news.

"Overall I don't think it is a good idea," said Dan Kennedy, a journalism professor at Northeastern University.

Kennedy said Facebook is not transparent about how it shows users news and the site can make changes that promote or demote content, which can have a major impact on news organizations.

"When news organizations turn over a key part of their publishing platform to large corporation with its own agenda there are some real risks," Kennedy said.

New York Times media critic David Carr, who died in February, said last year that media outlets "would essentially be serfs in a kingdom that Facebook owns" under such a plan.

"I can see why these news sites are tempted by the offer, but I think they’re going to regret it," said John Gruber who writes the "Daring Fireball" news blog.

Facebook's formula for structuring its news feed has long been a source of controversy, with some arguing it creates an "information bubble" that segregates readers into like-minded groups.

A study published last week by Facebook found this was not the case -- that the site's members were exposed to considerable "cross-cutting" content -- but some analysts said the conclusions were debatable.

- The future of news -

Danny Sullivan, founding editor at the Search Engine Land blog, said the move opens the door for Google to make a similar news partnership that could have a major impact on the news industry.

"I worry what it means when the free and independent web is mirrored within the walled gardens of two giants, Facebook and Google," Sullivan said in a blog post.

But City University of New York journalism professor Jeff Jarvis said the Facebook move is a watershed event for news.

"This is good news for news," Jarvis said. "If news and technology can come to terms, we can begin to reinvent journalism in a distributed world with new business models."

Jarvis said Facebook's move along with Google's efforts to partner with news organizations show a path for the future of the industry.

"We in media can't do it all by ourselves anymore," he said in a blog post.

"We are no longer monopolies in control of content and distribution from top to bottom. We now live in ecosystems where we must work with others. Get used to it. Find the opportunity in it."

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com