Facebook is planning to build a new platform that can open a personal site and distribute e-mail newsletters

Facebook has announced that it plans to launch a new 'free platform for opening personal websites and distributing e-mail newsletters' as a tool to empower writers and journalists who work individually.

Supporting Independent Voices
https://www.facebook.com/formedia/supporting-independent-voices

Facebook explores paid deals for new publishing platform --Axios
https://www.axios.com/facebook-paying-writers-journalists-pages-0b96d3cd-e61b-4435-9f54-99aed136f932.html

Facebook announced on March 16, 2021 that it will 'introduce a platform that empowers independent writers to help them reach new audiences and grow their business.' Information on the newly opened platform is summarized as follows.

A free self-publishing tool that offers a variety of options for delivering personal websites or email newsletters (email newsletters)

・ By integrating with Facebook page , content can be published in various media formats such as photos, live videos, and stories.

・ There is a function that can create a Facebook group and a community of readers.

・ The ability for readers to discover new content and writers allows creators and audiences to build direct relationships.

· Providing writers with tools to understand content performance

· Provides tools such as subscriptions for personal websites and businesses to successfully monetize

・ A service that allows creators to gather and learn together is provided.

According to sources from overseas news media Axios, the new publishing platform is not yet named, but is already scheduled to be tested by a small group of writers. Facebook is also reportedly paying several writers to launch the service.

Facebook isn't the only one considering providing tools for individual creators to use the platform to attract fans and monetize their content. Twitter acquired Revue, a newsletter distribution service, in January 2021 and announced that it will be introduced along with the paid function 'Super Follow' for individual creators.

Twitter announces 'super follow' function to display posts that are not displayed by normal followers by subscription method --GIGAZINE

The background to this is that many prominent journalists have left the company and started working on their personal sites in the wake of the epidemic of the new coronavirus infection (COVID-19). It is said that LinkedIn, a business-specific SNS, is also considering launching a creator program.

In addition, Google and Facebook collect and distribute various news on their platforms, butit has been pointed out for some time that this is depriving publishers who publish news. For this reason, a law is being enacted in Australia that states that 'social media that distributes news articles must pay the news article usage fee to the news distributor who published the article', and at one point Facebook was in Australia. It also developed into a situation where news distribution was stopped. This situation seems to have influenced the construction of Facebook's new platform that directly connects writers and readers.

Explaining Facebook's inability to deliver news in Australia-GIGAZINE