New York/San Francisco: “This is the first time we’re going to be forming long-term, stable relationships with publishers,” Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said. “For the first time we’re making multi-year financial commitments.”
Facebook is paying some publishers $1 million to $3 million a year to put their articles in the new section. In most cases, links in the new section will take readers back to publishers’ websites, which helps them attract advertising and subscriptions. That’s different from other Facebook initiatives, like Instant Articles, which kept readers on the main site.
Zuckerberg spoke at an event in New York at the Paley Center for Media, where he was in friendly conversation with Robert Thomson, CEO of News Corp. Thomson and his boss, News Corp. Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch, have been among Facebook’s loudest critics, calling on the company to pay media companies for articles the way that a cable-TV company pays Walt Disney Co. to carry ESPN.
Also read: What liberals don’t get about Facebook, facts and freedom
Facebook users want to see their friends and family in their news feeds, Zuckerberg said, and that they don’t have a lot of room there for high-quality news content. That’s why it’s better to have a separate tab, which will definitely draw a smaller audience, maybe 10% to 20% of the main feed, but that will still be significant. Facebook is working on similar partnerships around the world.
One challenge for Facebook will be getting people to visit the news tab, which will appear at the bottom of the app. It can be hard to change users’ habit of scrolling the News Feed, rather than clicking on a separate tab. Facebook’s streaming video tab, called Facebook Watch, has struggled to gain traction.
The news team will have editorial independence when it comes to stories about the company, Brown said. That means they can feature news about Facebook if warranted.
“There is a clear separation with regards to the editorial team,” she said. “They have independence and they can curate Facebook and would curate Facebook the way they would any other story.” – Bloomberg