Facebook’s News tab, which debuted in 2019 accompanied by substantial content deals totaling millions of dollars for various publishers (including $10 million for the Wall Street Journal, $20 million for the New York Times, and $3 million for CNN), is set to be permanently discontinued in April. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has announced its decision to “deprecate” Facebook News in both the US and Australia by April 2024. Additionally, Meta stated that it will not pursue new commercial agreements for news content and will refrain from introducing any new Facebook products tailored specifically for news publishers in the future.
This move marks a shift for Facebook, which has previously retreated from news initiatives, notably the Instant Articles feature. Signs of this pivot have been evident since 2022 when the company redirected its focus towards the Creator economy. Campbell Brown, former head of news partnerships, departed from the company in October of the same year.
Despite Facebook’s initial goal of supporting journalism and enhancing democracy with the launch of Facebook News in 2019, Meta now emphasizes that news content constitutes less than 3 percent of users’ Facebook feeds globally and plays a minor role in the Facebook experience for the majority of users. Consequently, Meta has opted to reallocate its resources towards content areas that align more closely with user preferences, particularly short-form video content.
Publishers are encouraged to continue sharing links on their own pages and leverage Meta’s existing products such as Reels and advertisements to drive traffic to their websites, thus shifting the focus away from news consumption within the Facebook ecosystem.
While the termination of Facebook’s licensing agreements is not new in the US, where such deals were discontinued two years ago, it will have a significant impact in Australia, where the platform was paying approximately $70 million annually to various outlets including Sky News Australia, News Corp, Seven, Nine, and The Guardian. These agreements, which were initiated following the enactment of Australia’s News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code, are nearing their expiration. The contentious power struggle between Facebook and the Australian government concluded in 2021 after legislative amendments were made, leading to a temporary news blackout on Facebook platforms. Similar tensions arose in Canada last year and expecting the same action will repeat in other countries as-well, resulting in news pages being blocked on Facebook and Instagram due to legislative disputes.
