Facebook set to unveil new 'instant articles' feature

Besides reducing time required for opening links, move to help Facebook retain users on its platform for longer

To increase user traffic and engagement on its platform, social networking giant Facebook is going to announce introduction of its new ‘instant articles’ feature. This will enable users to read articles from various sources directly on Facebook, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

Instead of having to click on links to articles that then redirect them to publisher’s domain, where the original article is published, this feature will reduce the time and effort users have to put in while surfing. This will also improve content distribution among users accessing Facebook through mobile devices; at present, they face issues while loading articles from external links.

 
Somewhat similar to LinkedIn’s pulse feature and Twitter’s ability to allow app users to read web article links on Twitter itself, this feature will help Facebook retain users on its own platform for a longer amount of time. That will also mean traffic to the publisher’s site will be curtailed: Usually, more than half the users visiting news sites are directed through links hosted and referred by Facebook.
 

Facebook has said this feature will also lead to increased readership due to faster loading time, as opposed to the usual eight seconds required to load a story published on an external site in the web browser through clicking on a link.

 
After talks with leading news publishers to host content directly on Facebook, the company roped in those like The New York Times, Buzzfeed, and National Geographic, by allowing them to keep all revenue generated from ads, if the ads were sold and hosted by the sites themselves alongside the original content. If it’s Facebook, and not the publisher, that is selling the ads, Facebook will retain 30 per cent of the earnings.
 
A large section of publishers continue to be apprehensive of relinquishing so much control to Facebook, in spite of these moves, as the company has not yet defined what control publishers will have over these ‘instant articles’. Many others, though, see this as a necessary move to survive in an age of digitisation.

 
Though the move is unconfirmed so far, it is expected to give Facebook, fast-becoming an advertising hub, a more commanding presence in the news business.