Facebook tests removing publishers from News Feed—unless they pay

Facebook tests removing publishers from News Feed—unless they pay

Facebook is altering how it shows posts like never before.

With multiple feeds, Facebook creates more places to hold users' attention.

BY KERRY FLYNN October 23, 2017

Watch out, publishers: a nightmare scenario for Facebook may soon be a reality.

The social network last week officially launched its secondary news feed called Explore. The feed generally features posts from Facebook Pages users don't follow. News Feed, meanwhile, hosts posts from friends and Pages users do follow.

But that's not true for everyone. In six markets, Facebook has removed posts from Pages in the original News Feed and relegated them to another feed, Filip Struhárik, editor and social media manager at Denník N, wrote. That means Facebook's main feed is no longer a free playing field for publishers. Instead, it's a battlefield of "pay to play," where publishers have to pony up the dough to get back into the News Feed.

It's a stark change from how media outlets have grown with Facebook. Publishers like BuzzFeed's Tasty and NowThis grew via distributing viral posts and videos on News Feed, as Ziad Ramley, former social lead at Al Jazeera English, wrote. While companies had to employ social media managers, they could generally rely on them sharing content without paying to boost it.

That game could be over, creating a nightmare situation for publishers while Facebook hopes it leads to more advertising revenue.

 Follow
Matt Navarra ⭐️ ✔@MattNavarra
Living off organic Facebook reach?
You’re in for a tough time
That free party is over.
News Feed in 2018 will be for paying guests only.
9:19 AM - Oct 21, 2017 · Clevedon, England
 
Twitter Ads info and privacy

For now, the setting is only available in Slovakia, Sri Lanka, Serbia, Bolivia, Guatemala, and Cambodia, according to Struhárik. A Facebook spokesperson told Struhárik it's a test but declined to share information on the timing.

“With all of the possible stories in each person's feed, we always work to connect people with the posts they find most meaningful. People have told us they want an easier way to see posts from friends and family, so we are testing two separate feeds, one as a dedicated space with posts from friends and family and another as a dedicated space for posts from Pages," a Facebook spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement to Mashable.

"To understand if people like these two different spaces, we will test a few things, such as how people engage with videos and other types of posts. These tests will start in Sri Lanka, Bolivia, Slovakia, Serbia, Guatemala, and Cambodia. We have no current plans to roll this out globally," the statement continued.

The change hasn't been good for publishers. Over the past couple days, publishers saw interactions on posts by the 60 biggest Slovak Facebook Pages fall dramatically.
  
Of course, the numbers could improve. Some Facebook users may not even know Explore exists or at least not be inclined to click to a new feed yet. But over time users could be motivated to navigate between the two feeds. The concept is quite similar to what Snapchat offers via Stories (individual accounts) on one feed and Discover (publisher content) on another. Snapchat's Discover section is far more curated than Facebook's wealth of Pages, however.

With multiple feeds, Facebook creates more places to hold users' attention. The hope for Facebook is more money. With multiple feeds, Facebook creates more places to hold users' attention and therefore show them ads. That's important for Facebook as it balances ad load — the amount of available real estate for ads — across its platform.

Facebook has already begun changing how it displays professional content. Facebook Watch is a separate tab for watching long-form, original video. Publishers told Mashable they appreciated Facebook's Watch initiative at launch since it incentivized them to create high-end content rather than relying on clickbait videos.

Navigating yet another feed won't be easy for users or for publishers. News Feed's algorithm has always been unpredictable, and now it's unclear how Explore could fair.


http://mashable.com/2017/10/23/facebook-explore-publisher-post-organic-reach-drop/#KhXYrtTLlPqW

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

BMW traps alleged thief by remotely locking him in car

BMW traps alleged thief by remotely locking him in car Stealer's Wheel? Seattle police department quotes "Watchmen" movie in a recap of the recent arrest. Tech Culture by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper December 4, 2016 5:00 PM PST It's maybe the most satisfying arrest we can imagine. Seattle police caught an alleged car thief by enlisting the help of car maker BMW to both track and then remotely lock the luckless criminal in the very car he was trying to steal. Jonah Spangenthal-Lee, deputy director of communications for the Seattle Police Department, posted a witty summary of the event on the SPD's blog on Wednesday. Turns out if you're inside a stolen car, it's perhaps not the best time to take a nap. "A car thief awoke from a sound slumber Sunday morning (Nov. 27) to find he had been remotely locked inside a stolen BMW, just as Seattle police officers were bearing down on him," Spangenthal-Lee wrote. The suspect found a ke...
Read more

Report: World’s 1st remote brain surgery via 5G network performed in China

World’s 1st remote brain surgery via 5G network performed in China Published time: 17 Mar, 2019 13:12 ·           A Chinese surgeon has performed the world’s first remote brain surgery using 5G technology, with the patient 3,000km away from the operating doctor. Dr. Ling Zhipei remotely implanted a neurostimulator into his patient’s brain on Saturday, Chinese state-run media  reports . The surgeon manipulated the instruments in the Beijing-based PLAGH hospital from a clinic subsidiary on the southern Hainan island, located 3,000km away. The surgery is said to have lasted three hours and ended successfully. The patient, suffering from Parkinson’s disease, is said to be feeling well after the pioneering operation. The doctor used a computer connected to the next-generation 5G network developed by Chinese tech giant Huawei. The new device enabled a near real-time connection, according to Dr. Ling.  “You barely feel that th...
Read more

New ATM's: withdraw money with veins in your finger

New cash machines: withdraw money with veins in your finger Cash machine technology that reads the pattern of finger veins is already available in Japan and Poland   By Telegraph Reporters 6:59PM BST 15 May 2014 Cash machines could soon be installed with devices that identify customers by reading the veins in their fingers. The technology is already being rolled out in Poland, where 1,730 cash machines will this year be installed with readers, negating the need for a debit card and Pin. Developed by Hitachi, the Japanese electronics firm, the machines read the patterns of the veins just below the surface of the skin on your finger using infra-red sensors. The light is partially absorbed by haemoglobin in the veins to capture a unique finger vein pattern profile, which is matched to a profile. The technology is used by Japanese banks and also in Turkey, offering “groundbreaking levels of accuracy and speed of authentication”, Hitachi said, which in t...
Read more