this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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Facebook ate and then ignored the news industry. It's hard, but we should leave it be (www.abc.net.au)
submitted 1 year ago by Nath@aussie.zone to c/australia@aussie.zone
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Try and get past the fact that this is sort-of about Facebook. Because it's more about the demise of news than it is about Facebook, specifically.

news organisations were never in the news business, Amanda Lotz, a professor of media studies at QUT, said.

"They were in the attention-attraction business.

"In another era, if you were an advertiser, a newspaper was a great place to be.

"But now there are just much better places to be."

The moment news moved online, and was "unbundled" from classifieds, sports results, movie listings, weather reports, celebrity gossip, and all the other reasons people bought newspapers or watched evening TV bulletins, the news business model was dead.

News by itself was never profitable, Professor Bruns said.

"Then advertising moved somewhere else.

"This was always going to happen via Facebook or other platforms."

It's a really fascinating read. We can all agree that independent journalism is valuable in our society, but ultimately, most of us don't so much seek news out as much as we encounter news as we go about our day.

I'm sure the TL;DR bot is about to entirely miss the nuance of the article. I recommend reading the whole thing.

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[–] CaptObvious@literature.cafe 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

As a former journalist, I agree that a robust news industry is absolutely essential to a functioning democracy. And while that should make it something to support with tax revenue, in the US right now, it’s terrifying even to imagine what Trump 2.0 would do with that control. It isn’t comfortable to think what Biden would do to silence critics who are complicating his re-election campaign.

However, I have to disagree with the professors’ basic premise about the Media Bargaining Code taking money from a profitable business to prop up an unprofitable one. First, news should be viewed as a public service, not a business. Second, Facebook et al. established and grew their ad businesses by relaying journalists’ work; that’s worth something. The fact that FB no longer wants to pay for the content they’re profiting off of is just too damn bad. Third, the complaint about redistributing wealth doesn’t hold water since that’s exactly what the traditional news outlets’ own ad businesses did: transfer wealth from profitable businesses (largely retail and services) to support a less profitable one (journalism producers).

I’m not Australian, so arguably I don’t have a dog in this race. But it doesn’t sit well to watch Facebook rape and pillage an entire vital industry and then just walk away leaving it for dead. They must be held to account.

[–] abhibeckert@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I think you’re wrong about government funded news. It will always be less biased than privately funded news because democratic governments (even Trump) are held accountable in a way that no private company ever will be.

We definitely shouldn’t get all our news from the government but it’s hardly the horror show Americans seem to think it is. Especially in a democratic country.

Facebook was not built on the backs of journalist has always been about chatting to friends and family first, strangers second, and news a distant third

Facebook has clearly stated they don’t profit off news. I’m inclined to believe them until proven otherwise, especially since I can open the Facebook app and there is literally no news anywhere to be seen.

[–] Zagorath@aussie.zone -1 points 1 year ago

Facebook et al. established and grew their ad businesses by relaying journalists’ work

Omg I am getting sick of hearing this lie. No, Facebook does not use journalists' work. The send the newspapers readers. They are adding value to the news orgs by giving them customers. It's ridiculous to double dip by expecting Facebook to also pay for sending them traffic.