Facebook first introduced NewsFeed as we know it today back in September 2006. Until now, it showed us everything from our friends’ posts to the posts from pages that we follow to the posts in the groups that we are a part of. Now, a little over 15 years later, the company is making an important change to the NewsFeed. Meta today announced that NewsFeed will now be just ‘Feed’.
“Starting today, our News Feed will now be known as “Feed.” Happy scrolling!,” Facebook announced via a post on Twitter. The company, however, hasn’t explained the reason behind this change. “It is just a name change to better reflect the diverse content people see on their Feeds,” Facebook spokesperson Dami Oyefeso told The Verge.
Starting today, our News Feed will now be known as “Feed.” Happy scrolling! pic.twitter.com/T6rjO9qzFc
— Facebook App (@facebookapp) February 15, 2022
However, things aren’t as simple as they seem in the Meta-verse. One way to look at this change is to see it as a way for the company to distance itself from a space on its platform that has been associated with misinformation for a long time now. Researchers in the past have shown that misinformation has a propensity to catch more eyeballs on the platform compared to news stories by verified news sources. Meta, on its part, has made changes to its platform such that its artificial intelligence (AI) based algorithms are better attuned at spotting and removing posts spreading misinformation. It has also hired more fact checkers to ensure that only the content that abides by its policies stays on its platform. However, the company hasn’t succeeded in its efforts so far.
The other way to look at it is that by renaming NewsFeed as Feed, Facebook is streamlining the space on its platform. The company earlier this week announced that it is rolling out a new ‘News’ tab on its platform for its users in France. This new News tab will spotlight news stories from a diverse range of reliable and relevant news sources. “As part of our ongoing commitment to journalism and content creation at Meta, this new tab will give people a dedicated space to seek out stories that matter the most to them, whilst ensuring original reporting is given a wider reach to audiences across the country,” Facebook wrote in a blog post.
So, taking away ‘News’ from the ‘NewsFeed’ could be Facebook’s way of distinguishing between News and the general non-newsy Feed.
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