Facebook thinks you’re spending too much time watching Tasty videos and not enough time checking in with Grandma.
With the intention of connecting Facebook users with friends and family, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has changed Facebook’s algorithm to make it more personal. Videos and other “public content” have taken over news feeds in recent years, casting aside more personal posts, according to Zuckerberg.
“Since there’s more public content than posts from your friends and family, the balance of what’s in News Feed has shifted away from the most important thing Facebook can do — help us connect with each other,” Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post.
However, this isn’t great news for media outlets who use Facebook as a major platform to share content.
Many news outlets and content publishers, from The New York Times to Buzzfeed to even Mustang News use Facebook as a way to spread their content. According to a 2017 Pew Research Center survey, 67 percent of adults get at least some of their news via Facebook, so these publishers are facing a tectonic shift.
If you’re a part of that 67 percent, there’s still a way to keep public content, like Mustang News, on your newsfeed. Here’s how you can change your preferences to prioritize your favorite publications:
On a mobile device
- Tap the three horizontal lines on the bottom right of the app.
- Scroll all the way down and tap on “Settings.”
- Tap on “News Feed Preferences.”
- Tap on “Prioritize who to see first.” This allows you to sort through people and pages and choose what you want to see.
On a desktop computer
- Click the downward-facing arrow farthest right on the menu bar at the top of the page.
- Click “News Feed Preferences” in the drop-down menu.
- Click on “Prioritize who to see first” to sort through the people and pages you want to see.
Facebook has become one of the worlds largest unofficial news publishers. The social media outlet has changed the game for media outlets, dictating the way they must present their content. However, now more than ever, their successes and failures are at the whim of Facebook.
“I’m worried that news and media companies — convinced by Facebook (and in some cases by me) to put their content on Facebook or to pivot to video — will now see their fears about having the rug pulled out from under them realized and they will shrink back from taking journalism to the people where they are having their conversations because there is no money to be made there,” City University of New York journalism professor Jeff Jarvis said on his blog.
Media companies will have to adapt, as will Facebook users.