Google stops prioritizing news sites with free content

Google has announced that it will end its ‘first click free’ program, which allows news sites that give away some free articles to rank higher in search results. Publishers can now decide for themselves how many articles they want to give away in this way.

According to Google, this is done through ‘flexible sampling’, which replaces the ‘first click free’ program. That program required news media to give away at least three free articles via Google Search and Google News. Afterwards, visitors were then shown a paywall. The minimum number of three has been in effect since 2015; in 2009 Google came up with a minimum requirement of five.

For example, media mogul Rupert Murdoch has criticized Google’s program in the past. The Wall Street Journal, part of its News Corp. company, said Google penalized the site for attracting subscribers when the site switched completely to a payment model. According to News Corp., Google’s current decision is a step in the right direction, Bloomberg reported.

Google also announced that it plans to work with publishers in the future to make it easier for readers to access paid content. In addition, the search giant wants to investigate how machine learning can be used to adapt the offer to the audience of a site.