Washington (AFP)
The world's largest social network Facebook has announced the launch of a news feed on Friday, in partnership with dozens of media outlets, the platform's latest initiative to promote journalism and shed its reputation for misinformation.
Facebook News that the network called "News" short will be powered by a selection made by professional journalists with the help of algorithms and initially intended for an American audience.
"We are now starting to test Facebook News, a news space on Facebook, for a sub-group of people in the United States," Facebook said in a statement.
Facebook News "will give the public more control over the articles they see and the opportunity to explore a wider range of their interests, directly through the Facebook app," the group says.
This news section will be separate from usual user feeds and will include articles from partner news organizations.
More than 200 media will be partners including the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Elle in the United States, People, ABC, CBS News, or Fox News.
This initiative is in line with the wish of Facebook boss and founder Mark Zuckerberg to promote "quality journalism" as he declared in front of Congress on Wednesday.
"We talked to news organizations about what they would like to see on a news tab, how their stories should be presented, and what scans to provide," said Campbell Brown, vice president of Facebook for partnerships. with the press and the project manager Mona Sarantakos, in a statement.
Facebook says it has set up a team of journalists with "editorial independence" that will select articles based on user-friendly guidelines. There will also be an algorithmic "customization" for the selection of this news.
© 2019 AFP