There’s a lot of fake news out there these days. You won’t find any on Crossing Broad, which takes journalism seriously, but a good amount false crapola appears on Facebook.

So Mark Zuckerberg is fixing that by partnering with real news outlets to provide…. real news on his platform.

Via the Philadelphia Inquirer:

Facebook, the social media giant criticized for spreading false information and hate speech online, has reached deals to pay The Inquirer, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, BuzzFeed, and other fact-based news organizations for content for a new feature.

Facebook is expected to announce the new Facebook News tab with agreements with hundreds of news organizations on Friday, marking the first time the fast-growing company has agreed to pay for news. Some newsrooms will be paid licensing fees.

…

The new licensing revenue provides some support as The Inquirer and other legacy news organizations face eroding print advertising revenue, in large part because of targeted ads on Facebook and Google. The added click-throughs to member newspaper websites from Facebook’s News feature could drive subscriptions at The Inquirer and others increasingly relying on revenue from digital subscriptions, company officials say.

The Facebook deal is estimated to be worth $500,000 a year for The Inquirer. Bigger news organizations could be paid a few million dollars or even more, published reports say.

It’s interesting, isn’t it? I don’t know much about the business side of Facebook, which I’m pretty sure was created to help people connect online. I’m even old enough to remember when only college students were allowed on the platform. Then yo momma signed up for an account and started commenting on every post.

But on a serious note it’s good to see the Inquirer finding a digital extension here, something that will bring in more money and perhaps help stabilize things over there. The company that owns the paper and the website recently went through another round of buyouts, layoffs, and fallout-relate shuffling, which saw the departure of John Smallwood, Rick O’Brien, Sam Donnellon, Sarah Todd, Zach Berman, and a number of behind-the-scenes editors and desk people.