Facebook is closing down its Trending Topics area

Facebook will eliminate its struggling “Trending Topics” area next week, the business stated Friday, signaling that the questionable function was much better off dead as Facebook constructs various items for news.

The area, which uses up essential property on the social media network’s desktop user interface, has actually dealt with reaction considering that it initially presented in2014 Often slammed for emerging conspiracies and phony details, like a scam about 9/11 and an incorrect short article about then-Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly, the Trending Topics area stimulated a protest in 2016 when a report declared the function intentionally reduced conservative news outlets.

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Why Facebook’s killing its trending topics

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Facebook’s reaction to that 2016 controversy — to pull human moderators off Trending Topics so it’s stocked purely by an algorithm — has been cited as opening the door for larger scandals like electorate tampering and misinformation campaigns. A perception that Facebook had editorial bias made leadership skittish about even creating the appearance it was suppressing news, which gave fake stories a clearer path to spread.

On Friday, Facebook minimized Trending Topics’ impact in a blog post announcing the change. “It was only available in five countries and accounted for less than 1.5 percent of clicks to news publishers on average,” Alex Hardiman, Facebook’s head of news products, said in the post. “From research we found that over time people found the product to be less and less useful.”

The date for Trending Topics to be removed is Thursday, June 7.

Facebook said it is testing different ways for news to spread on its Facebook instead, including a “breaking news” label and a dedicated section on Facebook for local news called Today In. It will also launch news videos like live coverage, daily news briefings and weekly deep dives in its Watch tab, the service’s home base for video. 

Facebook shared some early results from some of these product tests. The “breaking news” tag, which is being tested by 80 publishers, has caused a 4 percent increase in people clicking through links and an 11 percnent lift in people sharing those stories. The Today In section, which is being piloted in 33 US cities, is driving an average of 8 percent more traffic outbound from Facebook to the publishers themselves. 

First published June 1 at 8:20 a.m. PT.
Update at 11:06 a.m. PT: Adds date for Trending Topics to be taken down.

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