【Kelly the Coed 1 (1999)】

You might not know it,Kelly the Coed 1 (1999) but Facebook's not done with breaking news.

The company is rolling out its "breaking news" labels to publishers in Australia, France, Germany, Mexico, Spain and the UK, and will start testing the labels in Europe and Asia. The feature was previously only widely-available in the United States and Canada.

The labels allow publishers to append "breaking news" labels to a limited number of stories -- one per day, though most publishers only use them about once a week, according to Facebook.

"We've seen that breaking news posts about politics, crime, disaster, and business perform best. We're using data like this to help publishers understand how to use the label to connect people with the breaking news that they need to see most," writes Facebook product manager Joey Rhyu.

The social network first began testing the breaking news labels about a year ago. Back then, one of the main questions was whether the breaking news label would affect a particular post's ranking in the News Feed. At the time, Facebook said it wouldn't, but acknowledged that could change.

Now, a Facebook spokesperson tells me that it considers the "breaking news" tag an indication of "timeliness," which is one factor Facebook considers in determining where any given post should fall in your News Feed.

Mashable Light Speed Want more out-of-this world tech, space and science stories? Sign up for Mashable's weekly Light Speed newsletter. By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up!

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

This shows that Facebook is still trying to find a way to show its users newsworthy information in a timely manner -- something that Facebook's News Feed, which often surfaces days-old posts, has never been great at.

Facebook has a messy history with breaking news. The company introduced its now infamous "trending" section in 2014, which displayed popular news stories on the platform. Originally, these stories were curated by a group of human editors who selected which articles would appear for any given news story.

But that effort, which was largely run by contractors employed by Facebook, came under fire in 2016 when Gizmodo reported that the contractors regularly "suppressed" conservatives. The story resulted in a major backlash against Facebook, with conservative politicians saying it was proof the social network was biased against conservatives.

Much ink has been spilled about the ensuing controversy, which I won't rehash here, but Facebook promptly got rid of its human editors and opted to let its algorithms determine which topics and stories should appear in the "trending" section. But, even with human editors out of the picture, the trending section was still a bit of a disaster. The section still managed to amplify conspiracy theories and "news" from questionable sources.

So it was a relief to many when Facebook announced earlier this year that it would kill the "trending" section for good, which brings us back to breaking news.

With the ill-fated "trending" section gone for good, and publishers still wary of Facebook's commitment in the wake of bigger News Feed shakeups, the "breaking news" labels are a chance for publishers to still get some of their most important stories in front of readers on Facebook.

UPDATE: Nov. 2, 2018, 12:19 p.m. PDT Clarified the number of times publishers can use "breaking news" labels.

---

Featured Video For You

---

This bike path paves the way for future roads made from recycled plastic — Genius Moments

---

Topics Facebook Social Media

• Shopping
• Tech
• Deals
• Life
• Social Good
• Entertainment
• Science
• Digital Culture

• Virtual Reality: The True Cost of Admission (and Why It Doesn't Matter)
• Scary Children Reading, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• Happy 2013, From Mark Twain by Sadie Stein
• Where Daisy Buchanan Lived by Jason Diamond
• Exceptionally rare radio sources detected in the distant universe
• Apocalyptic Reads, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• Water and Wonder by John Lingan
• Old New York by André Aciman
• Character AI reveals AvatarFX, a new AI video generator
• Book Shopping with the Best

• Moving ACLU video tells the story of a trans teen who could make history
• 13 perfect Galentine's Day gifts for your forever friends
• 'Pokémon Go' craze leads to new permit requirements for ARGs
• Here's the real data on Trump's Twitter followers (who are a bunch of eggs)
• One teenager's Super Bowl parade sign shows how absurdly fortunate Boston sports fans are
• Deep sea craft filmed unprecedented footage of a colossal squid
• Christie Brinkley appears to defy gravity in 'Sports Illustrated' swimsuit issue
• Richard Hatch of 'Battlestar Galactica' dies at age 71
• U.S. satellites reveal China's solar dominance
• Obama and Richard Branson fought over kitesurfing and we're never getting him back

• Hurricane Laura's impact lingered with nightmarish mosquito swarms
• Educational Viewing by Sadie Stein
• Zora Neale Hurston on Zombies by Sadie Stein
• The Paris Review Mug: Now for Sale! by The Paris Review
• Best robot vacuum deal: Save $200 on Eufy X10 Pro Omni robot vacuum
• The Joys of Reading by Sadie Stein
• The Dickens Museum, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• A Conspiracy in a Teapot by Sophie Pinkham
• Galaxy S9+ vs Pixel 2 XL Camera
• Scott and Longfellow: Partners in the Long, Mild Twilight by Micki Myers

• Parental Controls: How to Lock Down Your Kids' iOS Devices
• Writing in Jewish, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• Zeus, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• How to be a Bureaucrat, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• Better Buy: Previous
• Literary Resolutions, and Other News by Sadie Stein
• Willem de Kooning, Untitled, 1970 by The Paris Review
• “Marley Was Dead: to Begin With.” by Sadie Stein
• Best Sony headphones deal: Over $100 off Sony XM5 headphones
• The Fitzgerald