‘Facebook News’ Coming Soon

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Friday that a new tab on his social network’s mobile app would provide a financial shot in the arm to the struggling news indstury and help fund “high-quality journalism” from major American media companies.

“There have to be people uncovering the truth,” Zuckerberg said.

“It’s no secret that the internet has really disrupted the news business and I really think that every internet platform has a responsibility to fund and support the news.”

The move to start paying for access to online news marked an abrupt about-face for the social-media titan, who long resisted the idea and last year said he doubted that it “makes sense” for Facebook.

It also came just days after his latest grilling on Capitol Hill, where US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-The Bronx, Queens) used a hearing about Facebook’s proposed “Libra” cryptocurrency to tear into Zuckerberg over his refusal to police political ads for accuracy.

Zuckerberg discussed his conversion during an appearance at Manhattan’s Paley Center for Media with News Corp CEO Robert Thomson, who started their conversation by asking: “What took you so long?”

Thomson noted that he and News Corp Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch have repeatedly called on Facebook and other digital platforms to pay a “premium” for the company’s content, and called Zuckerberg’s reversal “significant for the future of journalism.”

“Mark deserves credit for this digital, Damascene moment,” Thomson said.

Under the plan, which began a test run Friday for 200,000 Facebook users, the app’s “News” tab displays headlines that link to the websites where the stories were posted, or to the publishers’ apps.

Algorithms will pick some personalized links, but the “top stuff is going to be done by people with a background in this space” and all stories will have to be “fact-checked and objective,” Zuckerberg said.

While Facebook News will initially involve only major American news companies, Zuckerberg said he wanted it to expand to include local newspapers – which he called an “incredibly important area” – and eventually move overseas.

“We’re going to start small,” Zuckerberg said.

“I think we can get to 20 or 30 million people over a few years.”

Zuckerberg didn’t detail which news organizations were involved or how much they were being paid in licensing fees, saying only that Facebook had made “multi-year commitments” for “long-term, stable relationships with publishers.”

Reports Friday said that in addition to News Corp – which owns The Post, the Wall Street Journal and Fox News – Facebook had struck deals with companies including the New York Times, the Washington Post, USA Today, ABC News and NBC News.

News Corp’s deal is worth tens of millions of dollars annually, sources told the Journal.

David Chavern, CEO of the News Media Alliance trade group, said he was “encouraged” by Facebook’s move but complained that it was “far from a comprehensive solution.”

Edward Wasserman, dean of the graduate journalism program at the University of California-Berkeley, also told The Associated Press that he was worried “they’ll be applying Facebook logic to news judgment.”

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