Mark Zuckerberg has revealed his plans to add a dedicated tab for “high-quality news” to Facebook. The feature might be introduced to Facebook by the end of the year. The section might reportedly be free for users, although there is a chance of Facebook paying publisher whose work is featured.
Zuckerberg revealed the idea in a conversation with Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner, as a part of his goal this year to discuss future technologies in society.
“It’s important to me that we help people get trustworthy news and find solutions that help journalists around the world do their important work,” Zuckerberg wrote in a post alongside a video of the chat. Facebook could “potentially have a direct relationship with publishers to make sure that their content is available if it’s really high-quality content,” he noted to Döpfner. Nevertheless, it is unclear if Facebook would pay the publishers directly or offer a part of the ad revenue.
Notably, the news from Facebook’s plan to launch a dedicated tab for “high-quality news” comes a week later Apple introduced its magazine and news subscription service.
Not unlike Apple, Facebook might recruit editors, but Zuckerberg told Döpfner that he has not made up his mind about letting the users select most of what they see in the tab or have the staff member curate the content. Facebook has used editors to select trending topics items, though the social media platform faced bias accusations over the stories that were chosen for the now removed section.
The news tab is expected to work on a similar idea as of Watch–while videos still appear in the feed, Watch tab is the dedicated place for them. Facebook introduce Explore feature that separated posts from pages and those from friends and family, nevertheless, it did not prove to receive much traction.
Among the plans that have been announced by Facebook to support journalists, a pledge to invest $300 million in local newsrooms and grants for people with ideas is the latest one.
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