Facing much backlash over data privacy, Facebook has officially launched a dedicated News section. Facebook News is reportedly being rolled out for a small number of users in the US. While the social media giant hasn’t disclosed the publishers, expect content from big names like USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Time, The Washington Post, BuzzFeed News, and more.
“Today we’re starting to test Facebook News, a dedicated place for news on Facebook, to a subset of people in the US. News gives people more control over the stories they see, and the ability to explore a wider range of their news interests, directly within the Facebook app. It also highlights the most relevant national stories of the day. News articles will continue to appear in News Feed as they do today,” said Campbell Brown, VP, Global News Partnerships and Mona Sarantakos, Product Manager at Facebook.
Just like Apple, Facebook also mentioned that the News section will be curated by actual human editors. The lead section is called ‘Today’s Stories’ giving users the top events and happenings of the day. Like most News aggregators, it is personalised based on the kind of stories you read and will improve on offering content which better suit your interests over time.
Users will also be able to have better control over the News tabs they will have the option to hide publishers, articles, and topics that they are not interested in. There are also some dedicated sections like business, entertainment, science and technology, health, and sports. If you have subscribed to a bunch of publishers then you have the option of viewing those in a dedicated section. According to a report Facebook has also said “To ensure we’re including a range of topic areas, we’ll start by paying a subset of publishers who can provide a steady volume of fact-based and original content.”
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