The Broligarchs' Algorithmic Coup: How Musk and Zuckerberg Are Killing the News
Why Byline Times is launching the #BigTechFightBack to help rewire the reality-based independent news ecosystem broken by Facebook and Twitter/X
Five years ago, Facebook and Twitter (as it was then known) sent millions of readers to journalism like ours at Byline Times. The platforms once played a critical role in the public’s discovery of independent news — 2.5 million referrals just to Byline Times from each, every year. Now, that figure has collapsed: down to just one million from X and falling, and a mere 100,000 from Facebook.
And it’s not just us. This isn’t an isolated issue or a minor algorithmic tweak. This is an orchestrated throttling of fact-checked, editorial standard news and accountability journalism at the hands of two tech bros who inherited digital public squares and turned them into hostile playgrounds for outrage, conspiracy, and disinformation.
Welcome to the age of what award-winning journalist Carole Cadwalladr calls ‘The Broligarchs’ — where billionaires Musk and Zuckerberg have decided reality-based news no longer deserves a place in the newsfeed.
From Town Square to Walled Garden
There was a time when social media was genuinely a tool for democratising information. Twitter helped break stories in real time. Facebook was the place people found everything from local papers to global investigations. It was even home to a dedicated ‘News’ feed, populated with reputable outlets that were actively being compensated for their content. Journalism wasn’t just tolerated — it was amplified.
But that began to change once platforms discovered there was more money — and more power — in mayhem. Algorithms were tweaked to prioritise engagement — and what gets the most engagement? Rage. Emotion-led misinformation. Fear. While legacy media attempted to adapt (albeit slowly), independent outlets relied heavily on that digital lifeline. Now that lifeline has been cut.
Musk’s X-periment in Chaos
Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter was billed as a win for “free speech”. What it’s turned into is a sandbox for right-wing outrage merchants, while legitimate journalism is suppressed — or outright attacked.
Shortly after the takeover, Musk began dismantling the features that helped users trust the information they saw. Verified checkmarks were sold to anyone with a credit card. Link previews — the core way news stories appear — were removed, making news content less appealing and less clickable. He boosted far-right influencers, reinstated previously banned hate accounts, and algorithmically deprioritised posts with links, especially those from critical or left-leaning outlets.
Journalists have been banned without warning, labelled as “government-funded media,” or otherwise targeted by Musk directly in petty vendettas. And it’s working: referrals to news sites from X have plummeted. As news content becomes harder to find, sensationalist conspiracy posts go viral not because they’re informing the public but because they’re supporting Musk’s own agenda.
It’s not chaos — it’s a hostile takeover of the information space.
Zuckerberg’s Quiet Exit
While Musk’s war on news has been loud and proud, Mark Zuckerberg has taken a quieter route — death by a thousand algorithmic cuts.
Facebook once bent over backwards to court publishers, promising partnerships, traffic boosts, even payments. Then, when it no longer suited the business model, they pulled the plug.
First came the algorithm shifts deprioritising news links in favour of friends and groups. Then came the death of that dedicated Facebook News tab in multiple countries, followed by the decision to stop paying publishers altogether — including in countries like Australia and Canada where laws required them to. In response, Meta simply turned off news, making clear just how much power these mega-corporations and their owners had.
Now, even the pretence of responsibility is vanishing. In the US, Meta has stopped fact-checking political content altogether — just in time for Trump’s inauguration. The company has stated it intends to roll back fact-checking globally. For a platform built on the promise of connecting people and spreading truth, this is an abdication of basic civic duty.
Facebook and Instagram have become junkyards of clickbait and influencer content, with credible journalism buried beneath the algorithmic rubble.
The Real-World Fallout
The numbers speak for themselves. Byline Times went from 5 million combined referrals from Facebook and Twitter to just 1.1 million total last year — and we’re far from alone. Local newsrooms, investigative outlets, and public interest journalism are all being choked by design.
In the vacuum left behind, outrage merchants, AI-generated slop, and coordinated disinformation campaigns flourish. The Broligarchs say it’s about neutrality. But there’s nothing neutral about cutting off the oxygen supply to journalism while giving megaphones to those who peddle lies.
It’s Time to Fight Back
We couldn’t have built Byline Times in this environment. Independent, people-powered journalism now survives in spite of — not because of — social media. That’s why we’re launching the #BigTechFightBack: to fund new strategies, new platforms, and maybe even a new team member, to help us rewire the system they’ve broken.
Because this isn’t just about one outlet. It’s about whether the public will still have access to truth, scrutiny, and stories that hold power to account.
Help us build something better — not in a billionaire’s bunker, but out in the open, where journalism belongs.
Support the #BigTechFightBack crowdfunder here.
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