Paid content, an interesting dilemma

[MontyVeda]

I am confused, who would go to Facebook for news in the first place ... ?

no one... but...

Facebook is used locally for local news and information where I live and I think in many other places. ...

...this.

People who read 'proper' news share articles of local interest to the local FB groups. On the Beeb website and on the LancsLive website i can find lots of Lancashire news, but only on FB do i see news related specifically to the Lancaster area, without even having to look for it.

 

[the_mikey]

Whether or not you like facebook, the press are ultimately the gatekeepers to their own news services, they don't have to make it easy to share, but most news sites want you to share their news far and wide, there will be links on those sites encouraging you to share it with twitter, instagram, facebook, maybe others, but no-one puts their news online for no-one to look at, they do this in the hope that you'll click on a news article and the news service get's paid from advertising. This is ultimately their business model, selling advertising, only the truth is Facebook and Google are much better at it than they are, this isn't really about access to news, it's about getting more eyeballs to see their ads, they need Facebook and Google but they want their ad revenue too.

 

[stowie]

I cannot help but hope that Facebook have made a massive miscalculation here and it will come back to haunt them.

From news reports, it isn't just standard news outlets that are affected. For example indigenous health and media groups have been blocked which really isn't a good look for Facebook during the middle of COVID-19 and these groups feared to be at risk of taking up vaccinations (I expect indigenous groups have a huge scepticism of anything run by Aus government for very good reason).

On the other hand, it appears that misinformation sites are trundling along as usual, and the whole incident gives a lie to Facebook's argument that it is difficult to shut down extremist sites.

 

[IanSmithCSE]

Good morning,

... I think that's spot on, and whether by luck or design, facebook has managed to become that single site....

I think that Facebook have actually benefited from a restriction imposed by their business model.

If you compare a Facebook page with nearly any businesses' web site then the Facebook page will look terrible.

As Facebook serves up so many pages to so many users they need a consistent format and, especially if you go back a few years, the amount of data they send means that they want to send the smallest pages (size of images and mark-up) they can.

Yet many businesses' web site are created to show off the capabilities of the business that created the web site far more than address the actual needs of the business that purchased the site. If this were not the case then why are there so many businesses using Facebook only?

The Facebook page contain just enough information to be functional and without any design "features" that get in the way of using that page. As everyone knows that all Facebook pages look the same it doesn't matter how it looks.

If you go back far enough, the very first browser generally available to the general public (NeXtStation/NeXtCube) actually included an editor, there wasn't a difference between creating web content and consuming it.

Bye

Ian

 

[captain nemo1701]

I've been using the net since 1996. FB got big by offering people pre-fab websites for free. No need to build one yourself, just upload stuff into their template....and hey presto, your own 'site'. Yahoo use to do groups, but mailing lists now. I think old Geocities had something similar. I'm not on FB and never will be, don't trust Mr Z at all. He comes across to me as a devious little m****f***r. Empower yourselves, just delete your account. You didn't need it in past did you?.

 

[matticus]

I've been using the net since 1996. FB got big by offering people pre-fab websites for free. No need to build one yourself, just upload stuff into their template....and hey presto, your own 'site'. Yahoo use to do groups, but mailing lists now. I think old Geocities had something similar. I'm not on FB and never will be, don't trust Mr Z at all. He comes across to me as a devious little m****f***r. Empower yourselves, just delete your account. You didn't need it in past did you?.

That seems a very healthy attitude!
It's a laugh that Facebook claim their platform is a force for good, promoting exchange of information, global democracy, saving lonely rhinos, etc etc....
... it was actually created so that his mates could rank the fit birds on campus.

 

[Oldhippy]

I personally think social media is one of the worst things to ever come from technology. FB and it's ilk are just insidious data mining tools.

 

[byegad]

Disclaimer.
I use Facebook. I joined in 2013, in order to find out what my off-spring were up to.
That said, I find it a useful tool in keeping up to date with what's on/happening in general.
If there's no news then its utility would be much, much less for me.
The personal stuff might keep me on, but as I'm already not that happy with its hap-hazard layout, making finding a post I saw 10 minutes ago virtually impossible to retrieve, it would likely see me leave with no regrets.

As to the Oz government throwing a fit over Facebook's withdrawal of news, I think it's going to be very interesting to see which side wins.

 

[AuroraSaab]

I personally think social media is one of the worst things to ever come from technology. FB and it's ilk are just insidious data mining tools.

"If the product is free, you are the product.."

I don't know where I read that but I always try to remember it when signing up for stuff on the net.

 

[dutchguylivingintheuk]

What/who is a " proper news aggregator " ?

(I assume this includes CycleChat - other improper sites are available.)

I dont know the definition either however i think they mean sites that copy the whole or large parts of the article so poeple don't look at the original publicers site anymore. Cyclechat relies on users links to the source and mainly goes about discussing the news, also cyclechat does not make money out of these articles where as facebook and others do make money out of either keeping people onto their site our because of advertisement revenue