Facebook says it will invest $100M to support the news industry during COVID-19: $25M in emergency funding for local news and $75M in additional marketing spend
children are using Facebook Messenger Kids to deal with coronavirus isolation. Kids are getting a crash course on texting and social media with “technology on training wheels. https://twitter.com/... Michael Kimpton / @sketchthat : @seldo Not as good as cash, but when all governments are trying to tell their citizens how to stay safe the ads are incredibly useful. Mark Di Stefano / @markdistef : @seldo @GrogsGamut I did check this because it was my first read. But. Facebook is spending it on the ad space on news websites, TV, radio, newspapers themselves. It'll be advertising Facebook products, but they'll also be buying the space and donating it to small businesses. Ellen McCain / @respectwomen16 : @MikeIsaac Probably there most useful and important attempt to rehabilitate their well deserved bad image. Kate Gardiner / @kategardiner : Representing ... a drop in the bucket of the money that media lost by becoming Facebook and google-dependent. || Facebook Aims $100 Million at Media Hit by the Coronavirus https://www.nytimes.com/... Scott Galloway / @profgalloway : Facebook is giving $25 million to news organizations. In other news, the NRA is pledging $600 for kids shot in the face. https://www.cnn.com/... Eric Vicenti / @ericvicenti : @seldo It's like when experian tried to offer us free credit services instead of the $125 cash, after they misplaced all our data Rat King / @mikeisaac : $75 million in Facebook ad spend subsidized for newspaper SMBs basically this is a user acquisition campaign to drive local news subs cf. every startup spending millions in venture dollars on app-install ads https://www.nytimes.com/... Joshua Benton / @jbenton : Glad to see Facebook doing this, it's good PR and the grants are helpful. But spending $75mil buying ads for Facebook isn't an act of charity — it's just a welcome business transaction https://www.facebook.com/... Laurie Voss / @seldo : I don't know who needs to hear this but Facebook giving away $75m worth of free ads on Facebook when demand for ads has tanked anyway is not “investing $75m”. https://www.nytimes.com/... @wwd : Could @Facebook be local media's knight in shining armor? https://wwd.com/... Don Clark / @donal888 : Facebook's $100 million pledge for news media is good. But I wish they'd just share 5% of the ad revenue they make from those outlets' content https://www.nytimes.com/... Adam Mosseri / @mosseri : Happy to see us help the news industry navigate this crisis. https://twitter.com/... Evan DeSimone / @media_evan : This is the equivalent of burning someone's house down and then offering to mow the lawn. https://www.nytimes.com/... Jonah Peretti / @peretti : Facebook Aims $100 Million at Media Hit by the Coronavirus — Quality, publicly accessible journalism is essential to public heath, the Coronavirus crisis is hitting publications hard, this support is timely and needed 👏👏👏 https://www.nytimes.com/... Josh Jamerson / @joshjame : Campbell Brown, $FB head of news partnerships & former CNN anchor, on its cash for newsrooms: “Advertising money is shrinking fast and even though news consumption is up, it is not making up for those losses, so we are trying to help bridge that gap.” https://www.wsj.com/... Campbell Brown / @campbell_brown : Journalists are working around the clock to bring us vital information about the coronavirus outbreak. Today, Facebook is announcing a $100 million investment to support news organizations and reporters as they navigate the economic impact of the crisis. https://www.facebook.com/... Michael Learmonth / @learmonth : How about a rev share on advertising? A system to deliver subscribers? https://www.facebook.com/... Gaven Morris / @gavmorris : Let's say-as an extraordinary measure in these #coronavirus days-@Facebook committed 10 percent of annual profit (equivalent to the gdp commitment of some governments) to recovery, supporting journalism and content creators that make the stuff it sells: that'd be $700 million: https://twitter.com/... Jesper Doub / @sofus_d : These challenging times require strong and independent journalism! We are expanding our efforts to support the News Industry with additional $100 million. https://www.facebook.com/... Brian Stelter / @brianstelter : Just announced by Facebook: $100 million in new funding to “support news industry during the coronavirus crisis.” $25 million in direct grant funding, $75 million in marketing $$ since other advertisers are pulling ads https://www.facebook.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
This pledge extends a line Facebook had already drawn: its $300M three-year local news commitment from January 2019, now topped up with COVID-specific money as publisher ad revenue collapses. It lands two weeks after Facebook's $100M in cash grants and ad credits for small businesses, making news outlets the second constituency the company has moved to stabilize in March 2020.
The composition matters more than the total: only $25M is emergency grant funding, while $75M is additional marketing spend — ads for Facebook products placed on news sites, TV, radio, and newspapers. That structure lets Facebook book much of the outlay back as media buys while still claiming a $100M headline.
First-order effects
- Local newsrooms get an immediate cash cushion ($25M) plus a surge of paid ad placements at the exact moment their own advertising base is shutting down with the economy.
Second-order effects
- The spend doubles as Facebook brand advertising during a crisis of trust, so publishers are effectively carrying Facebook's marketing message while taking its money — a dependency that raises the stakes when Facebook later cites these figures as proof of good faith, as it did in its Australia defense citing $600M invested since 2018.
Third-order effects
- If crisis-era platform funding hardens into the main revenue bridge for local news, the bargaining position flips toward regulators and publishers demanding structural payment for content — the dynamic that later produced the Australia standoff rather than voluntary pledges alone.
The trend: Platform companies are converting voluntary news-industry spending into both reputational capital and negotiating leverage ahead of regulatory fights over paying publishers for content.