Facebook to help news outlets gain subscribers
WASHINGTON: Facebook announced on Thursday initiatives to help struggling news organisations gain paid subscribers, following a similar move unveiled earlier this month by Google.
The social network giant said it would test “premium news models” for organisations that deliver their content on Facebook, to enable the publishers to have more control over pricing, subscriber relationships and revenue.
Facebook said it would soon roll out the test to support new subscription models in Instant Articles in partnership with news organisations in the United States and Europe, starting with the Android application.
The leading social network said it would allow for “paywalls” in its Instant Articles feature, aiming to encourage users to sign up and pay news organisations whose content is linked through Facebook. If a person subscribed after prompting, the publisher would handle the payment directly and keep 100 per cent of the revenue, said Facebook.
Facebook said it would allow for various paywalls, including a “metered” system with a fixed number of articles as well as a “freemium model” where certain content was locked at the discretion of the publisher.
Included in the test will be Germany’s Bild and Spiegel, France’s Le Parisien, Italy’s La Republicca, the Telegraph and the Economist of Britain and the US-based Boston Globe and Washington Post.