Just as we think that people are beginning to understand how things work on the web along comes idiots like this. It was ridiculous when an organization like the Associated Press (AP) said that bloggers and the such were going to have to pay to be able to quote from any AP articles if the quote was over a certain number of words. Now it seems that PR firms and news monitoring services in England are going to be facing an effort by the Newspaper Licensing Agency (NLA) to impose a license fee for any links shared with customers.

This is according to a post at the Press Gazette by Matt Wardman where he wrote

According to a circular sent to members of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, and seen by Press Gazette, the NLA will be introducing a new form of licence from 1 September to regulate "web aggregator services (such as Meltwater) that forward links to newspaper websites and for press cuttings agencies undertaking this type of activity".

From January 2010, the licence charges will also apply to PR practitioners and "other organisations forwarding links to newspaper websites as part of their commercial activity".

The CIPR states that this will apply to "almost all newspaper websites excluding News International titles and the Financial Times".

NLA managing director David Pugh today confirmed the introduction of the new licence extension governing weblinks.

Do these people just not get it? The idea that they really think that they can actually make some-one pay a license fee in order to send links in an email is beyond stupid – it’s moronic.

Good luck with that.