Re:Big publishers are fleeing from Facebook's Instant Articles
by ethbro on Tuesday April 18, 2017 @09:54AM
(#14138792)
It's amazing how obvious it seems in hindsight, but it's a signal that if you change the underlying network architecture of how people consume content then the characteristics of popular content change.
Newspapers -> broadcast TV -> site based web -> network based web
I'd argue that network based web looks a lot more like the wild west days of hyper newspaper competition than broadcast TV. Fake news is essentially peer sourced yellow journalism. And I'm amazed publishers didn't see that coming -- there's historical precedent!
I don't think it is as simple as that. It is a fiasco at face value. Only if we think those smart people running Facebook and Google really thought Lizard People and Chemtrails believers have turned around the election and now they are on a noble mission to rescue us from such horrors, because you know, they are pure and noble, and not evil. At least that is how they framed it.
But I think it was a about something else. It was a signal to powerful advertisement buyers that traditional media (TV news channels, newspapers etc) have failed at manufacturing consent, and they shouldn't waste their money on them anymore. That market vacuum can now be filled Google and Facebook - "Don't let fake news ruin your next campaign. Come to us. We'll make sure only true news gets out".