For years, some publishers have been outspoken about the fact that Facebook has made ad revenue on their articles without compensating the outlets.
Now Facebook ($FB) is extending an olive branch and allowing some top media companies, including the Washington Post, New York Times, and News Corp, to share in the profits.
"It's no secret that the internet has disrupted the news business model," said CEO Mark Zuckerberg during a fireside chat with News Corp CEO Robert Thomson on Friday in New York. "Every internet platform has the responsibility to try and help fund and form partnerships to support news."
Facebook News is a dedicated tab on the Facebook app that will host original stories, subscriptions, and other personalized content. Users will be able to see stories across business, entertainment, science and technology, and sports, hand-picked by an independent team of journalists Facebook has hired. It will also feature local news from New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Philadelphia, Houston, Washington DC, Miami, Atlanta, and Boston markets, with more to come. Users will have controls to hide articles, topics, and publications they do not want to see stories from.
More than 200,000 people will be able to test out the feature as of Friday. It will be rolled out to other users in the upcoming months.
The initiative will pay certain outlets to license their content, although as well as follow any existing paywall restrictions. It will also allow users to import their subscriptions. The agreements range from hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars each year, sources told The Washington Post.
"I've believed for a long time it's very clear the work you all do in the news industry is very important for democracy," Zuckerberg said. "I believe in giving people a voice."
Many tech companies including Apple have recently dabbled in the news aggregation space. But Facebook has been trying to figure out the news space for several years now and has already faced intense scrutiny over bias and dissemination of fake news.
The company has put policies in place for the News tab in an effort to combat these issues. Facebook News publishers need to be in the company's News Page Index, abide by Facebook's Publisher Guide, and not have many community standards violations for complaints like hate speech and spreading clickbait.
Increasing the bar has affected Facebook's share prices, including a $119.1 billion market cap drop after it's July 2018 earnings report raised concerns about user growth, tied to increased privacy and security measures that led to the removal of tens of thousands of viral videos that violated the news policies. It remains the largest one-day loss of market value for any company.
But publications like the controversial far-right outlet Breitbart — which has called itself "the platform for the alt-right" - have passed muster with Facebook's rules. When questioned about allowing Breitbart on Facebook News, Zuckerberg declined to comment on specific publications but said he supported a variety of mindsets.
"Part of having this be transparent is that sources have to be from a diversity of views and different perspectives, but doing it so that it complies with the standards we set," Zuckerberg said. "Curators and the journalists are choosing the most relevant thing to surface, but I certainly want to include a breadth of content."
Earlier this week, Zuckerberg was in DC, ostensibly appearing before Congress to answers questions about Facebook's proposed digital currency, Libra, but the hearing expanded to numerous topics including issues of fact-checking and data privacy. Facebook also settled a lawsuit this month brought by advertisers over allegations it had provided incorrect viewer metrics on video content.
A big-screen adaptation of the anime “Chainsaw Man” has topped the North American box office, beating a Springsteen biopic and “Black Phone 2.” The movie earned $17.25 million in the U.S. and Canada this weekend. “Black Phone 2” fell to second place with $13 million. Two new releases, the rom-com “Regretting You” and “Springsteen — Deliver Me From Nowhere,” earned $12.85 million and $9.1 million, respectively. “Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc” is based on the manga series about a demon hunter. It's another win for Sony-owned Crunchyroll, which also released a “Demon Slayer” film last month that debuted to a record $70 million.
The Federal Aviation Administration says flights departing for Los Angeles International Airport were halted briefly due to a staffing shortage at a Southern California air traffic facility. The FAA issued a temporary ground stop at one of the world’s busiest airports on Sunday morning soon after U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy predicted that travelers would see more flights delayed as the nation’s air traffic controllers work without pay during the federal government shutdown. The hold on planes taking off for LAX lasted an hour and 45 minutes and didn't appear to cause continued problems. The FAA said staffing shortages also delayed planes headed to Washington, Chicago and Newark, New Jersey on Sunday.
Boeing workers at three Midwest plants where military aircraft and weapons are developed have voted to reject the company’s latest contract offer and to continue a strike that started almost three months ago. The strike by about 3,200 machinists at the plants in the Missouri cities of St. Louis and St. Charles, and in Mascoutah, Illinois, is smaller in scale than a walkout last year by 33,000 Boeing workers who assemble commercial jetliners. The president of the International Association of Machinists says Sunday's outcome shows Boeing hasn't adequately addressed wages and retirement benefits. Boeing says Sunday's vote was close with 51% of union members opposing the revised offer.
The stunning indictment that led to the arrest of more than 30 people — including Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and other NBA figures — has drawn new scrutiny of the booming business of sports betting in the U.S. The multibillion-dollar industry has made it easy for sports fans — and even some players — to wager on everything from the outcome of games to that of a single play with just a few taps of a cellphone. But regulating the rapidly-growing industry has proven to be a challenge. Professional sports leagues’ own role in promoting gambling has also raised eyebrows.
Tesla, the car company run by Elon Musk, reported Wednesday that it sold more vehicles in the past three months after boycotts hit hard earlier this year, but profits still fell sharply. Third-quarter earnings fell to $1.4 billion, from $2.2 billion a year earlier. Excluding charges, per share profit of 50 cents came in below analysts' estimate. Tesla shares fell 3.5% in after-hours trading. Musk said the company's robotaxi service, which is available in Austin, Texas, and San Francisco, will roll out to as many as 10 other metro areas by the end of the year.
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