Meta Platforms announced that it will no longer pay US media outlets to have their content appear on Facebook’s News tab, as it reallocates resources in the face of the economic downturn and changing user behavior.
Posted at 5:20 p.m.
The social media company explained on Thursday that most people “don’t (come) to Facebook for the news, and as a business, it doesn’t make sense to invest too much in areas that don’t match preferences. users “.
Meta, then called Facebook, launched the partnerships in 2019. The “News Tab” section of the Facebook mobile app in the United States only displays headlines – and nothing else – from wall street journalfrom washington postBuzzFeed News, Business Insiderfrom NBC, from USA Today and Los Angeles Times, notably. The company didn’t say how much money it pays to news outlets, but reports put it in the millions for major outlets such as the wall street journal.
The Associated Press did not participate in the initiative.
At the time of the program’s launch, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told the AP that he saw “an opportunity to establish new, stable, long-term financial relationships with publishers.”
But Meta, which is based in Menlo Park, Calif., said in a statement on Thursday that “a lot has changed since we signed agreements three years ago to test the provision of web links. ‘additional news to Facebook News in the United States’.
On Wednesday, Meta Platforms posted the first drop in revenue in its history and also forecast weak results for the current quarter.
Meta does not pay for news content that is published on its platform. The “News Tab” agreements, the company explained on Thursday, “ensure that we have access to more of their article links and that we include a range of topics from launch.”
The company added that the Facebook News initiative would continue in the other countries where it is currently taking place and that the change in the United States would not change the agreements in those places – the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia.