Facebook won’t let you edit article headlines, description anymore

As a part of its crackdown on fake news, Facebook is removing the ability to customise headlines, description, and images shared by publishers. Here's what's going to change in coming days

By: News Desk |
July 7, 2017 5:01 pm

Facebook is one of the biggest social media platforms of the modern times. Once upon a time, it was used to connect to our near and dear once. But over the years, it has outgrown itself becoming a giant that not only helps businesses to connect with their customers but has also become one of the biggest news distribution systems in the world. From private blogs to news by media giants, Facebook today caters to the global content production community like never before.

The abundance of such news distribution channels has also prompted the menace of fake news spread like a wildfire on its platform. In the past, the social media giant has been severely criticised for its inability to curb fake news. Incidents like the US Presidential Elections 2016 have further strengthened the need of having a strict and a more effective method of filtering out fake news.

After months of research and analysis, Facebook has finally come out with a basic strategy to make News Feeds genuine and more informative.

As a part of its crackdown, the social media giant is ‘removing the ability to customise metadata’ from all entry points on Facebook.

Here’s what is going to change in the coming days:

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– Publishers won’t be able to customise headlines, description, and images in the links that they share.

– This is likely to affect the publishers who customise their content to appeal to specific audiences on Facebook.

– The developers are constantly working to help publishers customise their content on Facebook.

– While these changes are being incorporated, publishers will be able to control how their links appear on Facebook using Open Graph meta tags.

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While this will bring some good news for Facebook users as their News Feeds would feature more authentic content and less fake news, it would also ring a bell of caution for publishers who use misleading headlines and description in their posts. This step will not entirely eliminate the menace of fake news, it will prove to be a stepping stone in assuring that low-quality content remains off Facebook’s platform.

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