Danish publisher TV Midtvest challenged its editorial team, who relies heavily on Facebook for website traffic and interaction with readers, to a two-week 'detox. To test what impact this will have on their publishing model, TV Midtvest decided to take a radical step and stopped using Facebook for full 14 days, leaving followers with a simple announcement inviting them to use the website instead. Inactivity on the social network resulted in loss of 27 percent of users in two weeks but TV Midtvest only saw 10 percent decline in page views, proving that people can find their way to the website if they want to. "We thought people will never find us without Facebook, but they did." Although losing a quarter of users 'hurt' the editorial team realised these readers are less valuable as their loyalty outside of Facebook is very low. "My main takeaway was that I never want to be this dependent on one platform," said Nikolajeva who built most of her career around Facebook. "I had to act on the insecurities I had around functioning without Facebook. If there's another platform coming around, I won't react in the same way," she added. "Journalists are too blind to see how dependent we are of Facebook." Read more