In 2021, over two billion people used Facebook, one of the Big Tech companies based in the US. The users are in countries that do not block access to the social media network, which has been bugged by controversies in recent memory.
There are other social media sites that are accessible in the Philippines but Facebook is the emperor. According to German database firm Statista, the Philippines had over 82 million users in 2021, placing the country in sixth place among 20 countries that have millions of Facebook users. India, a big country in South Asia, ranked first with nearly 130 million users last year.
So the online study by the Ateneo School of Government showed that 78.8 percent of its 2,000 Filipino respondents get their news from Facebook feed, beating other online media and traditional sources like television, radio and newspapers.
According to the random survey conducted from Oct. 27 to Nov. 12 last year, 66.1 percent of the respondents get their news from TV, 56.7 percent from YouTube, 53.3 percent from news websites, 32 percent from radio, 30.2 percent from messaging apps (Viber, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Telegram), 21.7 percent from Twitter, and 17.9 percent from print media.
Two in every three respondents (71 percent) said they pay attention to posts about government and politics on their Facebook feed; over half of the respondents said they click on the link of the whole story or watch the video at least most of the time whenever they see a political news story on their feed, according to the Ateneo study.
Facebook’s dominance in the Philippines is undeniable. These days, it is the main vehicle of promotion of Filipino politicians running in the May 9, 2022 polls.
Ateneo’s online survey also explains why traditional media companies in the Philippines can not neglect the power of Facebook’s octopus-like reach. The local media are utilizing it to reach a wider audience and promote their stories. Even in the US, big-name news companies like the New York Times and the Washington Post have a presence on Facebook despite some of their reports exposing the social media’s mischief.
Some of the problems of the company (renamed as Meta) that remain unsolved till this day are its failure to halt the spread of disinformation, misinformation and hate speech despite its formation of teams that monitor such negative activities. It still has a lot of work to do.
Most respondents in the Ateneo random online survey said they have multiple news sources, indicating Facebook is not their only source of information. This is good news. Solely depending on Facebook for information limits the reader’s perspective.