Facebook's latest do-over: Journalists over algorithms

Facebook's latest step in its fight against fake news is to ditch technology in favor of humans.

On Friday, Facebook unveiled a new section of its mobile app called "News Tab," dedicated to delivering news content from various publications, The New York Times reports.

Facebook News will be tested with 200,000 users in the U.S. in the coming months, and will display personalized news, along with a local news section called "Today In," CNET reports. The stories will be pulled publications like CNN, NBC News, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Business Insider, and also alt-right platform Breitbart, the Times notes.

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And CEO Mark Zuckerberg — who reportedly feuded with media regarding his lack of compensating publishers, even as late as May 2018 — is now offering up to $3 million a year to publishers to purchase licensing rights, The Verge reports.

Campbell Brown, Facebook's head of news partnerships, explained their new approach to journalism, in ditching the algorithms, and told the Times, "our goal is to provide a personalized, highly relevant experience for people."

"For the Top News section of the tab, we're pulling together a small team of journalists to ensure we're highlighting the right stories," he added.

The Silicon Valley giant's previous effort in news aggregation, "Trending News," which was largely moderated by algorithms, was nixed last year after it amassed widespread criticism for disseminating fake news. But it's not the first one to switch back to humans; Facebook's competitor, Apple News, also employs traditional journalists to edit and curate the subscription news app, notes the Times.