Facebook is reportedly responding to bad press by promoting Facebook in users' News Feed, apologizing less

Mark Zuckerberg
(Image credit: Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Facebook, tired of all the news stories about how it had become a cesspool of vaccine misinformation, conservative agitprop, body-shaming, and other societal harms, came up with a plan at a January meeting to use Facebook's own News Feed to promote Facebook, The New York Times reports. CEO Mark Zuckerberg signed off on the initiative, code-named Project Amplify, in August, and the company quickly began test-marketing the plan in three U.S. cities.

"The idea was that pushing pro-Facebook news items — some of them written by the company — would improve its image in the eyes of its users," the Times reports, citing three people with knowledge of the effort. "But the move was sensitive because Facebook had not previously positioned the News Feed as a place where it burnished its own reputation. Several executives at the meeting were shocked by the proposal, one attendee said."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.