
Media Companies Are Getting Sick of Facebook - champagnepapi
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-19/media-companies-are-getting-sick-of-facebook
======
Animats
_“Media companies are like serfs working Facebook’s land.”_

Content companies, really. Anybody can make content now. Look who's mentioned
in the article as an example of a "news source" \- the CEO of "Thrillist",
"NowThis News", and "Dodo". It's owning the pipes, and being able to restrict
them, that makes money.

This is a big change. The Internet was supposed to be about disintermediation.
Anybody can view CNN, Fox News, Russia Today, or the South China Morning Post
at any time. Yet about half of Americans get their news on Facebook. Facebook
isn't even a very good news aggregator.

Remember, sharing is spamming. When you "share" a story, you're just helping a
spammer spam.

~~~
jobu
> _When you "share" a story, you're just helping a spammer spam._

The spammers are getting really savvy about it too. I recently read an article
in my feed that was interesting and funny, so I shared it. The next day my
wife asked me why I shared that garbage site, and when I looked at it on her
phone the formatting was completely different. It was now a 10 page article
with a mess of ads and a paragraph or two of text on each page.

They created some decent content with a catchy headline. Then they seeded it
out on social media and waited until it had "gone viral" before they crammed
it full of shitty ads.

~~~
Joof
So you're saying we need immutable facebook links?

~~~
danso
You mean, immutable pages -- it seems the link was the same (unless the
spammer did a 301), it's just that it was loaded with ads after it became
popular. FWIW, this is a reason Facebook uses to advocate for its Instant
Articles platform (and Google advocates for its AMP).

~~~
taneq
What are these "ads" things you speak of? I seem to remember the term from
back before I installed uBlock Origin but it's been so long...

~~~
dvtv75
You've apparently been downvoted, but you raise a good point - although not
the immediately obvious one:

I've been seeing ads that get through uBlock Origin in the last few days. Just
a couple, I haven't bothered investigating it.

------
ageitgey
A good companion article to read is "Your Media Business Will Not Be Saved"
[1], written about a year ago by the guy who founded The Verge before he
launched The Outline.

The basic argument is that these media companies are chasing readership scale
(via Facebook exposure, etc) as a way to solve the problem that no one
actually values what they produce very much. And that they keep chasing the
next "tech thing" as a solution to get more readership scale instead of just
producing good content for an audience that actually cares about them.

It's a very cathartic read if you are jaded about the current online media
world.

[1] [https://medium.com/@joshuatopolsky/your-media-business-
will-...](https://medium.com/@joshuatopolsky/your-media-business-will-not-be-
saved-1b0716b5010c)

~~~
shostack
What is fascinating is to see FB successfully employ the same general strategy
to publishers as they did advertisers.

With advertisers, they got everyone excited about the ability to reach their
audience through a new channel. It had some similarities to email in that FB
encouraged you to get Likes on your page, and then everything you posted would
in theory reach your audience. Then they gradually tightened the screws in the
name of declining user experience with too much garbage in the feed, which
became algorithmic instead of sorted by recency.

This in turn let them flip the switch and move to basically zero reach unless
you pay. And not just pay a flat rate based on however thousands of users you
have (like email providers), but a dynamic pricing auction that maximizes
revenue for FB. So advertisers invested all this time and major dollars on
building their FB base, without actually owning the contact info or the
ability to reach those people without paying FB. Frog successfully boiled.

Now with publishers they got them all excited about the reach they get for
their content, and then slowly choke them via Instant Articles. Since
publishers are so reliant on the revenue from FB, they have ZERO leverage in
these negotiations, much like when Google says "sure, you don't have to have
your content indexed." FB can now decide how benevolent it is feeling towards
publishers, and there's nothing they can do about it.

------
cocktailpeanuts
I think a bigger problem is that readers are getting sick of media companies.
It's not Facebook's fault.

Most of what happens on Social Media nowadays is driven by media companies'
efforts to generate revenue no matter what. Since humans respond to
provocative content, that's what becomes prevalent on the Web.

Even if Facebook were to go away today, these media companies will make the
same mistake and try to take advantage of their users the same way because
that's how they can survive in this age.

I have zero sympathy for media companies getting sick of facebook.

~~~
cbhl
At some level, readers have stopped paying media companies, and so media
companies do whatever it takes to make ad money come in.

I feel like people used to have newspapers and magazines (like Nat Geo)
delivered to their door all the time. And they'd have a cable subscription to
subsidize CNN.

Maybe someone should create a news network that is distributed by Spotify.

~~~
criddell
> I feel like people used to [...]

People used to have far fewer choices. When I was a kid, we received a daily
newspaper and National Geographic and I would read them both. I would also
read every word on every panel of the cereal box. I was bored most of the
time, especially over the summer. Now I have the reverse problem - too many
things to do and not enough time to spend.

> Maybe someone should create a news network that is distributed by Spotify.

News outlets put stories on Snapchat. I think that's pretty close to what you
are suggesting.

~~~
notfromhere
Downside is that writers like getting paid even the paltry sums they already
are being offered. I feel media made a big mistake in the 90s by making online
content free

~~~
criddell
I don't think there's really any other way things could have unfolded. Legacy
publishers had to compete with new publishers and many of the old companies
were in pretty terrible shape.

------
two2two
As someone who hears the gripes from content creators about how facebook
restricts their reach depending on the source of that content and based on
that to whom it's shown; it appears that facebook doesn't mind sacrificing
efficiency of the web to increase their position of power.

Content creators have to work twice as hard, publish twice as much and take up
twice as much storage space because of facebook's walled garden.

Taken to the extreme this is an ugly future of wasted time and resources to
bend to facebook's constant tweaks which are not in favor of the content
creators, but the advertisers.

I wonder if, at some point, social sanctions will be pressed on one another to
consider the use of facebook toxic to oneself and others, no different than
smoking?

~~~
spyhi
> Taken to the extreme this is an ugly future of wasted time and resources to
> bend to facebook's constant tweaks which are not in favor of the content
> creators, but ~~the advertisers~~ facebook.

Small correction: Content creators _are_ the advertisers. If you want the
audience you've built to see the content you've made, you pretty much have to
buy ads in the form of "boosts" and other ad units. At this point, everything
is looping around to benefit Facebook. I see more sponsored posts for content
than for products these days, honestly.

------
vthallam
>Ben Lerer, CEO of online video machine Group Nine Media (Thrillist, NowThis
News, the Dodo), says that while he’s not satisfied by his deals with
Facebook, he’s optimistic they’ll improve. Either way, he says, “whining and
complaining that Facebook isn’t making you money is probably not going to be
the most successful approach to building a partnership with Facebook where
they make you lots of money.”

Says the CEO of companies which were completely built on the viral factor and
will not be able to serve without social media. no surprises there.

Also, every media company now crazily rely on Google/FB for users, as i see
it, there's no escape, sadly.

------
kirykl
Unfortunately Facebook's content can only be free, because its a reflection of
its audience. And its audience values worthless content.

That leaves publishers with nothing but their worthless content when they've
outsourced all distribution to Facebook

(Worthless meaning low intrinsic value, high attention getting value)

------
tempodox
I keep wondering what made the news outlets surrender to FB so quickly in the
first place. Did they really think it was to their advantage?

------
ihsw2
Facebook should look to independent content producers working off of Patreon
-- their by-line is exactly what media companies are looking for:

> Best way for artists and creators to get sustainable income and connect with
> fans

Either buy Patreon outright or offer a competing platform. At this point the
PHBs at Facebook have to decide whether they prefer their business connections
to media conglomerates or sidestep them completely by establishing their own
content producing platform.

------
mark_l_watson
Curated content direct from the content producers is the way to go. I think it
a poor practice to use Facebook for anything but quickly catching up on what
family and friends are doing.

I am a happy consumer of other social media because I try to follow relatively
just a few people who have interesting things to say and provide interesting
links. It is the people, and relatively few of them, that provide some value
from Google+ and Twitter.

------
evolve2k
> "If journalism isn’t surviving in this environment, that’s bad for society,
> but it’s also bad for Facebook"

Similar to the statements of a zoo keeper, maybe the word to consider is
'thriving', not just 'surviving'.

------
mschuster91
I'm getting sick of the huge volume of garbage in the whole Internet. Idiots
on Facebook (which I cannot unfriend for reasons) keep flooding my timeline
with right-wing "alternative news" XXXXX (but thankfully, Facebook got rid of
Farmville spam!), Youtube has been overtaken by Let's Play XXXXX, clickbait
and the videos of "omg i was shopping here are my clothes" Instagram fame
XXXXX.

And many newspapers these days, even formerly respected Spiegel and
Sueddeutsche Zeitung, seem to think it's worth their time to publish clickbait
stuff... argh. Is there any idiocy-free space left on the net?

~~~
coralreef
You can use the unfollow button, its quite effective.

------
jbb67
"Facebook announced it would allow publishers to put more ads in Instant
Articles"

Yeah, that should make it more popular.

------
usmeteora
I thought this was going to say "people on facebook are getting sick of media
companies" but I keep forgetting people are the product and not the customer.

Wait no I didn't forget. That's why I left.

------
tiffanyh
But what's the alternative to Facebook for media companies?

There's Google and that's about it.

So even though this article might have a lot of merit to what it states, there
really isn't any good alternatives to using Facebook (besides maybe Google).

~~~
adventured
> But what's the alternative to Facebook for media companies?

Here's what's going to happen, it's very predictable: inflection.

At peak fear, when nearly everyone is screaming at the top of their lungs
about Facebook crushing earth (with inbound anti-trust attention), an
inflection will be getting birthed that will be busy undermining the reason
for that laughable mass dread.

The inflection - which has never not occurred, especially in technology - will
be the birth of a thousand new distribution points, which will increasingly
rip attention away from Facebook. These new distribution points will be
narrow, hyper focused, they'll serve their audience radically better than
Facebook within any given category.

I'll emphasize it one more time for anyone too emotional on this topic to
think straight: there isn't a single example in recent tech history, in which
an inflection didn't break down a formerly dominant position. Not one example
in the last 60 years. We're nearing peak Facebook, the screaming is beginning
as one would expect; government attention is next up, talk of regulation or
breaking it up will become extremely common ('what to do about Facebook' is
coming to the cover of magazines); meanwhile, right this moment, those
thousand new points of distribution are being born, while few are paying
attention. As Facebook reaches peak time-on-site saturation, it'll begin to
bleed dominance, very very slowly at first, then it'll cascade.

------
throwawaymanbot
Facebook = AOL With AI. We should call Facebook AIOL in honor of this.

Delete Facebook, instantly have less problems. Especially with annoying
advertisers. Simple!

------
jimjimjim
Garbage has been monetized. Garbage has been weaponized.

------
jonbarker
Incidentally fb video seems to load very slowly when tested with identical
videos loaded on the same connection in youtube.

------
ungzd
There's not much difference between random copywriters on Facebook and
"reputable" newsletters, latter only having more valuable brand name and more
aggressive paywalls and anti-adblockers. Quality of content is the same, never
ending special olympics in filling void with most intricate, convoluted words.

------
perseusprime11
Media companies don't have much choice.

------
cratermoon
"viewership is its own reward"

Bahaha. Seriously, that's like the corporate version of "we'll pay you in
exposure". I can't eat exposure, and media companies won't take "viewership"
as a substitute for revenue.

------
Jimmie_Rustle
LOL, I am surprised CNN was able to get ANY money out of FB.

------
AznHisoka
Facebook isn't a dictatorship. They're not forcing media companies to stay on
FB.

If you're sick of FB, then don't produce videos for them. Don't use Instant
Articles.

Going even further, delete your FB company page, stop posting FB updates, and
stop buying FB ads.

Last I checked, media companies aren't paying FB in order to post content
there (yes I know there are ads but media companies aren't complaining about
ads).

~~~
whytaka
Wasn't there a huge problem with Facebook Video stealing content from others
with impunity?

~~~
abritinthebay
Was more _users_ doing that _via_ FB Video, but yes.

