Posted Sep 5, 2023, 7:04 PM
A little tour and then go… Meta is preparing to stop Facebook News next December in new European countries. This tab dedicated to news was launched in France in February 2022, with more than a hundred media partners, newspapers, magazines and television channels.
The end of the offer affects France but also Germany and the United Kingdom, a sign that the American giant is distancing itself from traditional media. The principle was as follows: publishers could offer links to their content in a dedicated space for a fee from Meta.
“We know that people don’t come to Facebook for news and political content – they come to connect with people and discover new opportunities, pions and interests,” says the social network. in a blog post, saying they want to focus on short videos in particular. Press publishers will, however, continue to have access to their Facebook accounts and pages. And in France at least, we can always share articles on our main Facebook feed.
Artificial intelligence
Nevertheless, this judgment will represent a real shortfall from the end of 2024, the date of the end of the contracts in France. The remuneration for Facebook News represented a substantial part of the envelope paid by Meta to the French media, several tens of millions of euros (counting this service and the remuneration under neighboring rights, which is an independent agreement). “It’s not very reuring for information, deplores Pierre Pétillault, director of the Alliance of the press of general information (Apig). The imbalance between media and platform is growing”.
Apig is particularly concerned that content generated by artificial intelligence will invade social networks, to the detriment of the media. Furthermore, there is a risk of an information bubble, if these are less visible.
Apig must renegotiate its neighboring rights agreement with Meta during 2024, which will make it possible to see more clearly on the real loss of the media.
This announcement by Meta comes in a particular context of “fronde” between the American group and the media in Canada, while news content has been blocked everywhere on Facebook since a new law.