Photo via Flickr/aspeninstitute-internal
Photo via Flickr/aspeninstitute-internal

In the latest battle in an age-old dilemma: Should the media write stories of importance that the public should know about? Or should they cater to the public’s whims?

Media mogul Arianna Huffington has penned a memo to her Huffington Post staff, asking them to happy up their copy. The reason? “Facebook’s proprietary news algorithm currently privileges ‘stories of people and communities doing amazing things,’ so HuffPost needs to publish more of those stories,” according to the report by Gawker.

In the memo, Huffington announces HuffPo’s new mantra, called “What’s Working,” a global initiative to “double down on our coverage of the positive stories and solutions to major challenges the media too often overlook.”

Here’s part of her memo with the directive:

“While we will continue to cover the stories of what’s not working—political dysfunction, corruption, wrongdoing, etc.—as robustly as we always have, we want to show that the era of ‘if it bleeds, it leads’ is over, and start a positive contagion by relentlessly telling the stories of people and communities doing amazing things, overcoming great odds, and facing real challenges with perseverance, creativity, and grace. As the #1 social publisher on Facebook, we’ve learned these are the stories our readers are most interested in reading and sharing.”

It’s a delicate dance for sure, but one that was usually determined in ye olden days by the publication and its editorial staff. The web has changed how people consume news drastically — and, for better or worse — clickbait often dictates what gets posted. But should major media organizations be adjusting content based on Facebook feeds?

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