Friend or Foe? Social Media, Privacy, and The Sharing of News

Abstract:

National governments have long staked an interest in the persistence of local news media. In particular, policymakers are concerned about the role of content aggregators, such as news aggregators, social media and search engines, as a gateway to news websites. The content aggregators feature links to news stories on other sites. In 2021, the Australian government proposed a bill that required technology platforms, such as Google and Facebook, to pay a news site whenever they linked to its news stories. 

In response to the proposed bill, Facebook prohibited Australian users from sharing news content for 8 days. To illuminate how social media generates traffic for news sites, we study this natural experiment using difference-in-differences estimation. We provide evidence that news sites lost incremental revenue and online views, whereby the top 20 publishers suffer from greater losses than smaller publishers. Our findings suggest that intermediary websites facilitate rather than restrict monetization and access to news content. We discuss the implications for policy makers and marketers.

The Seminar will be held in Seminar Room RuW 1.201 as well as broadcasted via Zoom.

Join Zoom Meeting

https://uni-frankfurt.zoom.us/j/68139554111?pwd=bm82eXAyOTNVZ0NIU3RUQ0FmZXo5QT09

Meeting ID: 681 3955 4111

Passcode: 558251

More information on Nico Neumann can be found here.