Facebook is changing what its users will see to highlight posts they are most likely to engage with and make time spent on social media more 91裸聊视频渕eaningful.91裸聊视频�
By cutting back on items that Facebook users tend to passively consume, the change could hurt news organizations and other businesses that rely on Facebook to share their content.
The idea is to help users to connect with people they care about, not make them feel depressed and isolated.
91裸聊视频淭he research shows that when we use social media to connect with people we care about, it can be good for our well-being,91裸聊视频� Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg Thursday.
91裸聊视频淲e can feel more connected and less lonely, and that correlates with long term measures of happiness and health. On the other hand, passively reading articles or watching videos 91裸聊视频� even if they91裸聊视频檙e entertaining or informative 91裸聊视频� may not be as good.91裸聊视频�
Shares of Facebook slid more than 5 per cent to $177.31 in premarket trading Friday after the change was unveiled.
Under the revised regime, there will be fewer posts from brands, pages and media companies and more from people. There will be fewer videos, which Facebook considers 91裸聊视频減assive.91裸聊视频� People will likely spend less time on Facebook as a result, the company says.
That91裸聊视频檚 because even if people read such content on Facebook, they don91裸聊视频檛 necessarily comment or interact with it in other ways.
But Facebook gave scant details about how it would define what91裸聊视频檚 91裸聊视频渕eaningful.91裸聊视频�
The changes could shrink the social media giant91裸聊视频檚 role as a major news source for many people.
91裸聊视频淚t91裸聊视频檚 in the same direction that Facebook has been pursuing for a while: offering a place for discussion among individuals, a community space, rather than being a news source,91裸聊视频� said Oh Se-uk, a senior researcher on digital news at the Korea Press Foundation.
91裸聊视频淚t wants people who have been friends to become even closer, to have deeper discussions (on Facebook). Traffic to news media91裸聊视频檚 websites via Facebook will likely fall,91裸聊视频� he said.
The move will not affect advertisements 91裸聊视频� users will continue to see the same ads they have before, 91裸聊视频渕eaningful91裸聊视频� or not. But businesses that use Facebook to connect with their customers without paying for ads will also feel the pain.
Facebook has long been criticized for creating 91裸聊视频渇ilter bubbles,91裸聊视频� the echo chambers of friends and like-minded people whose views are reinforced by their friends91裸聊视频� posts on the platform.
The company says that91裸聊视频檚 similar to how people make friends and interact with each other offline. Facebook says its research shows that users are exposed to more divergent views on its platform than they would be otherwise, but that91裸聊视频檚 hard to verify independently since the company is cautious about providing data to outsiders.
Oh, the researcher at Korea Press Foundation, said it was too early to say whether the latest measure would reinforce Facebook91裸聊视频檚 91裸聊视频渇ilter bubble91裸聊视频� effect or not. 91裸聊视频淲e won91裸聊视频檛 know until we see what happens.91裸聊视频�
The changes come after a tough year for Facebook that included congressional hearings on how Russia used it to influence the 2016 U.S. elections. Former executives and Facebook investors have spoken out about how it and other social media sites might be hurting rather than helping society and users91裸聊视频� psyches.
Last week, Zuckerberg said his 91裸聊视频減ersonal challenge91裸聊视频� for 2018 (something he91裸聊视频檚 done every year since 2009), will be to fix Facebook.
91裸聊视频淔acebook has a lot of work to do 91裸聊视频� whether it91裸聊视频檚 protecting our community from abuse and hate, defending against interference by nation states, or making sure that time spent on Facebook is time well spent,91裸聊视频� he wrote.
Tweaking users91裸聊视频� feeds may cause the social media platform to lose some of its lustre for content producers or media companies, especially video makers that cannot make money on Facebook regardless of how many of their videos go viral, said Cho Sodam, founder of Dotface, a youth-oriented media startup based in Seoul, South Korea.
91裸聊视频淣o matter how well we do on Facebook and how great our videos are, making high-quality videos itself does not bring us any profit,91裸聊视频� said Cho.
The 1-year-old Dotface has 110,000 fans on its Facebook page, its primary channel for reaching viewers. Dotface91裸聊视频檚 videos about a South Korean mother giving a hug to young sexual minority people who could not tell their parents about their sexual orientation struck a chord with viewers around the world, accruing 5 million views and many shares, comments and likes. But those views, comments or share generated no revenue for Dotface.
Cho said her company is expanding links to other platforms, such as YouTube, that share profit with content creators.
___
AP Technology Writer Youkyung Lee in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this story.
Barbara Ortutay, The Associated Press
