Facebook News started in Germany
(Photo: Jakraphong Photography / Shutterstock)
On Tuesday, Facebook launched a separate area for journalistic content in Germany. A selection of news content is now presented in the “Facebook News” both in the app and on the website of the online giant.
“With ‘Facebook News’ we want to make more quality journalism available to the people on our platform and at the same time offer publishers more monetization options,” said Facebook manager Jesper Doub of the German press agency. At the start, 35 publishers with more than 100 media brands are part of “Facebook News”.
“Facebook News” was introduced in October 2019 in the USA. The service started in the UK in early 2021. Germany is now the third country in the world where Facebook and publishers cooperate in this way. The service will appear to users in Germany in the course of the day.
On Monday, the media group Axel Springer surprisingly announced that it would be on board for “Facebook News” as part of a comprehensive international cooperation. The Südwestdeutsche Medienholding (“Süddeutsche Zeitung”, “Stuttgarter Nachrichten” and “Stuttgarter Zeitung”) is a new addition to the current list of cooperation partners.
Contents
Not necessarily exclusive messages
In the case of “Facebook News”, the media houses are paid to link content that was previously not shown on the platform. But they don’t have to be specially produced for Facebook. In the future, current headlines will be presented in this area, selected by a team of journalists to keep Facebook users informed of the latest news.
With the help of algorithms, “Facebook News” will also offer personalized content. This selection is based on the messages that users read, share and subscribe to. “This allows them to discover new interests and topics in their favorite media or publications that they have not followed before,” said Doub. The network also offers traditional categories in “Facebook News” (business, entertainment, health, science & technology and sport). The offer also includes so-called collections. These are special subject areas that are created depending on the location. There is currently a Covid-19 collection. dpa
