Biggest Brazilian newspaper quits Facebook
Brazilian newspaper Folha de São Paulo has announced it will no longer post news stories to its Facebook page as a response to the company's changes to the News Feed algorithm.
According to the Brazilian company, Facebook's policy changes to emphasize posts from connections rather than brands will reinforce users' tendency to share content they agree with, thus facilitating the creating of opinion bubbles. Folha argued that the changes will also increase spreading of fake news.
In an article, Folha said the relevance of Facebook to its readers was declining anyway and that the policy changes only led to the final decision. According to Folha's own research, shares, comments and likes for the 10 biggest Brazilian newspapers via Facebook fell 32 percent in the 12 months from January 2017.
"In effectively banning professional journalism from its pages in favour of personal content and opening space for 'fake news' to proliferate, Facebook became inhospitable terrain for those who want to offer quality content like ours," Folha's executive editor Sérgio Dávila told The Guardian.
Some 6 million people follow Folha on Facebook, making it the Brazilian newspaper with the largest follower base on the platform. The company will keep its page but will no longer update it.