Facebook’s not showing any signs of slowing down according to an article I’ve just read on Tech Radar. Currently, news content is shared on Facebook via links, and users have to visit an external site to read it. But the social media site is reportedly in talks with some media outlets to host news content within the site. This would mean us not having to leave Facebook to read about world affairs, as the site would have its own dedicated news section.
I may be among the masses to blame for Facebook’s potential new move. PR Daily has reported that 88% of millennials use Facebook as a news source, suggesting that news consumption over social media could become more prevalent as time progresses. Not only that, the future could see social media in charge of their own news outlets.
Of course, news dispersed over social media can receive comments, likes and shares just the same as a status update. As the article in PR Daily points out, the amount of interaction news content receives is partly how social media users judge news items to be reliable. It’s probably safe to say that we also use the amount of interaction it receives as a way of judging whether it’s worth viewing. We’re all more likely to click on a story that receives a high number of comments. If news becomes integrated into social media, perhaps the likes of Facebook will tell us themselves what news stories we should view based on its interaction. Might social media become the judge of what is interesting news and recommend news items to us?
As a B2B PR agency, we like to consider the changing face of how news is delivered. News has become a key activity over social media and may soon become a subsection of it. With more and more of us accessing the news via our handheld devices, could searching for the headlines via social media channels stop us looking for it elsewhere?
Alex Brown has just started his career at Skout PR and will be a regular contributor to the Skout blog.
