META, in announcing the shutdown, claimed that its users did not frequent Facebook for political and news-related information but rather to make new friends and find employment.
Facebook’s parent company, Meta Platforms, has made public a plan to phase out the ‘Facebook News’ section of the mobile app in the United Kingdom, France, and Germany by the end of the year.
‘Facebook News’ is a section of Facebook accessible only to users in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and France, and was designed specifically for those who wish to stay abreast of daily headlines and news stories.
Although the ‘Facebook News’ function will be deactivated later this year, Meta will still enable users to read links to news stories, and news publishers will be able to maintain access to their Facebook accounts and Pages.
However, Facebook will cease negotiating any new commercial partnerships for ‘Facebook News’ content and will also cease developing any new products for news publishers in these countries.
According to Meta, who wrote a blog post on the shutdown, “news makes up less than 3 percent of what people around the world see in their Facebook feed,
According to a blog post published by the company, “Facebook News” will be discontinued since users aren’t interested in the platform for news and politics but rather as a social and professional networking tool.
The growing calls from governments around the world for social media and internet behemoths to share more of their advertising profits with news publishers may be another factor in its decision to distance itself from the news function.