Not so long ago, Facebook was a goldmine for Australian news media. News featured prominently in Australians’ Facebook feeds, and newsrooms across the country saw a growing online audience engage with their stories.
People were liking, commenting and, most importantly, sharing stories, delivering new eyeballs to news outlets. This revolution in news distribution encouraged many of Australia’s biggest news media companies to invest time and money into posting on Facebook.
But the relationship between Facebook and news companies has soured. Facebook famously changed its algorithm in January 2018 to reduce “audience exposure to public content from all pages, including news” in favour of posts from family and friends.