This is the social media issue du jour ; the big headline being that Meta is now censoring its political content so that people have to proactively enable their desire to see "politics in their timeline."
The biggest topic of industry focus this last week: The discovery, possibly that princess Kate also suffers from cancer and has perhaps become the headline for the non-industry media chat too. The two are connected in the sense that I explain how.
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So first off, on Meta's political news restrictions. This has actually already been happening for some time, with Meta actively stepping back from news and politics since 2021.

Why? Because for Meta, political discussion is actually more trouble than it's worth. The company has come under intense scrutiny, and has copped various fines, due to the role that it may or may not play in political campaigning.

Meta was fined $5 billion in 2019 because of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, where the agency was accused of targeting the voters using their psychological tendencies through Facebook. In furtherance of that, several Russian-based influence operations aimed at the US elections are under probe on Meta even before the US 2016 election. Political biases are also levied by its trending topics by applying moderation decisions and other issues such as restricted reach to some topics.

Really, it's a lose-lose situation for the company: let more in, and get accused of undermining democracy, or bar more and get accused of the same.

But even more than that, Facebook and Instagram users have been actively telling Meta that they want to see less divisive political content in their feeds.

Last year, Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said:

One of the most common feedbacks we are hearing from our community at this time is that people do not want politics and fighting to dominate their experience on our services.

That's what sparked Facebook's first forays into cutting back on political content more broadly, and with news and politics only making up about 3% of what people see in either app anyway, it seemed like a plausible avenue, despite the perception that it drives significant engagement.

It indirectly provided Meta with new direction on this by permitting short-form video clips that are systematically recommended and are not restricted based on pages or people one follows.
The users complained first, voicing their displeasure at the change, which suddenly saw a pile of random video clips showing up in their feeds. But the statistics tell their own story: since the implementation of AI-based content recommendations, usage on Facebook and Instagram has gone up, with as much as 40% of the content that users are shown in the app now coming through this system.

And so, about entertainment-based content, it seems that people are reacting quite well to it and, more headaches are being found in politics. Hence, in general, politics seems to be removed with some sense.

You can still choose to see political posts and follow accounts posting political content; Meta's systems will continue to surface those in your experience. But effectively, what it means by setting political content opt-in is that, by definition, political posts-and associated accounts-around getting fewer reach.

But again, the logic is pretty sound, especially going into what will hopefully be a pretty contentious US Presidential campaign.

That brings us to the British Royals and the big news of the week. The other inevitability of Meta's change is that other salacious content is going to get more reach as a result, so you can basically expect Facebook and IG to become more like supermarket tabloids, as opposed to political polarization systems.

Why? Because most of research shows that, in the opposite direction, just as well, it is such a content that stirs feelings or otherwise catches attention and elicits involvement. It's exactly for that reason why politics becomes such sensational news. Because it profoundly impacts people and politicians promoting ideas in that vein do a pretty good job when social media is in power.

But now, when these posts are no longer filling that space, anything else that gets people's juices flowing is going to find a new audience.
 
Is that better? Well, Hollywood gossip in general is less harmful so probably yes, and if engagement in both apps continues to climb, despite that reduction of politics-related content, it seems like that might well end up working out for Meta.

With the obvious qualification that there is a question regarding what qualifies as "political," and the current guidelines around that have been very vague regarding what, exactly, is impacted by it:

Informed by research, our definition of political content is content likely to be about topics related to government or elections; for example, posts about laws, elections, or social topics. These global issues are complex and dynamic, which means this definition will evolve as we continue to engage with the people and communities who use our platforms and external experts to refine our approach.

The generalities here may play out in different ways for brands and publishers, and as mentioned, that will lead to other stories getting bigger as a result.

And while many have criticized Meta for actively retreating from politics, and the broader impact that may have, for Meta itself, it could end up being both a logical and beneficial shift.