Facebook's banning of Australian news : Local grassroots websites impacted

 

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 Local grassroots website and email newsletter "In The Cove" this morning became another casualty of Facebook's banning of Australian news content. 

The site shares a mix of news and local information from around the suburb of Lane Cove in Sydney, from suggestions on unblocking drains, to reports on local Concerts, sporting championships, Christmas gift suggestions, and local raffles. 

The website keeps locals up to date through its Facebook page, followed by more than 6,500 residents, and is not a registered media outlet. In The Cove Founder, Jackie Barker said Facebook was "the number one way" news was disseminated to subscribers. 

"I'm going to lose a bit of a demographic and it's going to put me back five years but local news, there's a desert in local news at the moment, and hyper-locals like "In The Cove" provide that information."