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News Corp Dithers on Google Pullout While AP Asks For More Traffic

Duncan Riley — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 02:01:06 +0000

News Corp has indicated that its expected withdrawal from Google search results won’t be for months, while on the same day AP has met with Google asking for more traffic.

News Corp’s chief digital officer Jonathan Miller told the Monaco Media Forum that the withdrawal from Google’s search results will occur in “months and quarters – not weeks.” He went on to say that “the traffic which comes in from Google brings a consumer who more often than not read one article and then leaves the site. That is the least valuable of traffic to us… the economic impact is not as great as you might think. You can survive without it.”

Across the Atlantic, Tom Curley, president of the Associated Press, was reportedly ready to meet Friday with officials at Google about getting a better deal for links to AP stories provided by the search engine.

Curley wants Google to elevate the ranking of AP stories so they appear more prominently in search results. He also wants a cut of the revenue from ads Google runs alongside the top news stories. Curley claims that AP gets paid for less than 15 percent of its stories on the Web.

What does it say about News Corp’s stance when the main body owned by media outlets in the United State, the main cheerleader against new media is actually asking for more Google traffic, the same traffic that Murdoch and Miller say is worthless?

The delay to News Corp pulling out of Google once again proves that News Corp is all talk and no action when it comes to their constant attacks against the likes of Google. There’s ZERO technological basis for the delay because as we’ve repeated time and time again: one line in a Robots.txt file is all that’s required. If they had the courage of their convictions they’d be taking themselves out of Google not next week, not tomorrow, but today.

Part of this story from AHN under license.

The AP hooks up with Microsoft to battle Google

Steven Hodson — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 21:03:57 +0000

Tom Curley, CEO of The Associated Press was in Hong Kong recently where he would tell anyone who would listen that the times are a changing and Google had better watch out. During the Xinhua Beijing Media Summit Curley once more made it quite plain that he thinks that all the AP’s woes can be traced right back to the doorstep of the evil money grubbing Google. All that is about to change according to him because the “real content producers” aren’t going to be giving away the farm like they have in the past.

Part of this new policy of “play with us or don’t play at all” will include their recently announced News Registry and most likely the plan to allow some providers to cough up extra money to be able to access AP content before their competitors. No more favorable conditions for the providers as far as Curley is concerned. It’s all about bowing to the wishes of the AP as was caught on an audio tape during the conferences and provided to Zachary M. Seward at Nieman Journalism Lab.

We are only going to work with those who use our principles. We are not going to work with everybody. So if you don’t agree to our protocols, if you don’t agree to give us real-time metrics, we aren’t going to work with you. So when I sat down in the portal negotiations, you know, I said, this time is different. You have got to be able to give us the metrics. This is not about money. We’ll get to the money part of the conversation later. If you want our content, these are the things you have to do. And that’s what I outlined. If you can’t do that, or if you won’t do that, let’s not waste time. And so far, everybody’s doing technical due diligence, including us.

When asked if Microsoft was willing to kowtow to what the AP wants Curley had this to say:

Someone asked Curley if Microsoft was willing to accept the AP’s demands. “They have said very strongly that they would,” Curley responded. A bit earlier, he said of Microsoft, “They know how to have a conversation.” And what about Google? “I’m not talking about Google,” he said. “We haven’t talked. We haven’t talked. We haven’t talked with them in any serious way.”

Along the way Curley also blamed the DMCA for letting companies like Google to get away with shafting the real news content providers. As well with some allusion to some new multimedia technology from Microsoft (which apparently they’ve been one of the only companies it has been shown too) being a game changer there is supposedly some huge looming partnership deal coming between the AP and Microsoft.

If Curley is really deluded to the degree that he thinks The AP can be saved by hitching its future to Microsoft/Bing/Yahoo then I think he’s been drinking too much sake. As for the idea that companies like Google, Microsoft, and other news providers are going to turn back the hands of time to a period where The AP might have been the king of news then they are in for a rude awakening.

For every new demand that The AP decides to throw down on the negotiating table there will be umpteen different companies out there that will willingly provide better alternatives. Just ask Reuters – they’re already doing it.

AP offers to sell the hot news while it’s still hot

Steven Hodson — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 08:40:12 +0000

Hot news available to the highest bidder or the one’s most willing to cough up the money to be first in line. That’s the newest money making idea to come out of the Associated Press. The idea is that the AP will sell news stories to some of their more exclusive online customers for a certain period of time ahead of their competitors.

AP’s Chief executive, Tom Curley uses the tired old excuse that sites like Google have been reaping fortunes off of AP’s articles, photos and video without fair compensation.

Curley said the new products the AP is exploring include premium-priced information on certain topics.

And, he added, "products can be reserved, and there can be exclusives given, perhaps on a time-base measure. Those who get access to that content and the rich multimedia or metadata that comes with it might get an exclusive for, oh, 20 or 30 minutes."

Source: AP/Google News – AP might charge some customers to get news earlier

Tie this in with their idea for some sort of news registry that will be used to track unauthorized use of their news and the AP believes that it will be able to recoup the tens of millions of dollars that they have lost over the years.

Fail: AP has granted us a license to quote Voltaire

Duncan Riley — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 02:14:33 +0000

James Grimmelman posted earlier today that AP granted him a license to quote Thomas Jefferson as part of an exercise to prove the stupidity of AP’s attempts to crack down on copyright by charging those who use more than five words in an AP article.

I’m not American so I’m not that familiar with the writings of Jefferson, however there is one quote I do like to use, and that’s the quote attributed to Voltaire (wrongly as the case may be, but besides the point here.) The line also one of the best lines ever written about censorship:

I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.*

Voltaire died in 1778, and the quote is believed to have been delivered by Betrice Hall of the Friends of Voltaire in 1906; either way the quote is in the public domain.

So why, like Grimmelman with his Jefferson quote, did AP happily license the Voltaire quote to me? See the picture above for proof. They’ve also charged $12.50 to my credit card.

Grimmelman writes that “The AP has no right to stop me, no right to demand money from me.” I’d actually go further by calling this what it is: a scam. AP seeks to make money off the words of history, mocking copyright laws for its own greed. It’s a shame there’s not a BBB for News Wire services, because we’d at least have someone to complain to.

* note on the quote: there’s a couple of different variations on the theme for the quote. That’s not the exact wording I knew, but was one version commonly found on Google.

AP’s DRM – just another boatload of crap

Steven Hodson — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 19:10:00 +0000

In light of the recent news about how the Associated Press was going to wrap all its news in some fandangle new kind of DRM which they weren’t going to talk about it anymore both Duncan and I posted our opinions. While Duncan took the more subtle sarcastic approach I went for the more “are they frikken stupid” line. As the rest of the blogosphere had their say as well Ed Felton from Freedom to Tinker decided to take a closer look at exactly what the AP was proposing.

Now if you don’t know of Ed Felton you’re missing out on the thoughts and opinions from a very smart man who has caused more than his fair share of grief when it comes to things like e-voting and other important security related matter. It turns out that Ed isn’t overly impressed

It seems that there is much less to the AP’s announcement than meets the eye. If there’s a story here, it’s in the mismatch between the modest and reasonable underlying technology, and AP’s grandiose claims for it.

The key component of AP’s plan is a new microformat that they and the Media Standards Trust introduced a couple of weeks ago. After looking at this part of the plan to DRM the news Ed had this to say

Unfortunately for AP, the hNews spec bears little resemblance to AP’s claims about it. hNews is a handy way of annotating news stories with information about the author, dateline, and so on. But it doesn’t "encapsulate" anything in a "wrapper", nor does it do much of anything to facilitate metering, monitoring, or paywalls.

AP also says that hNews " includes a digital permissions framework that lets publishers specify how their content is to be used online". This may sound like a restrictive DRM scheme, aimed at clawing back the rights copyright grants to users. But read the fine print. hNews does include a "rights" field that can be attached to an article, but the rights field uses ccREL, the Creative Commons Rights Expression Language, whose definition states unequivocally that it does not limit users’ rights already granted by copyright and can only convey further rights to the user.

So in other words folks this new initiative from the Associated Press is nothing but a smoke and mirrors show not only meant to send us bloggers cringing back into our holes but also make newspapers who sign up believe that the AP has them covered – when in fact they don’t. Instead they will have been conned into forking over good money for something that doesn’t really exist.

I for one welcome AP’s war on links and fair use

Duncan Riley — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 04:17:49 +0000

With AP declaring all out war on links and fair use, the chorus of dissent has been unsurprisingly negative in return. Everyone from bloggers through to senior media journlists have called the move stupid through to bat-shit crazy.

I for one welcome welcome AP’s war on links and fair use. Indeed as a small media publisher I’m disappointed that it didn’t start last year, or even the year before. This AP declaration war on links and fair use is the end game, and the results will be brilliant.

Linking

When AP tries to impose a license fee on linking to its content, people will stop linking to AP content. Not just some sites, but 99% of sites. There may be no official boycott as such, but likewise most won’t be interested in battling AP in court. The result will be a big drop in traffic to AP content as the link juice it previously had disappears, juice that also helps their search engine rankings.

But it could be better again, because big players like Google won’t stand for paying for the right to link, so AP content may disappear altogether from most search engines as well.

The net result is that papers who rely on AP content online will see their traffic and online revenue plummet at a time that many of them are struggling to survive as it is. The drop in newspaper advertising may have driven many of them to the point of extinction, but AP will help push them off the final cliff.

Fair Use

The attack by AP on fair use, a doctrine established by the newspaper industry itself will prove disastrous to non-AP and AP member newspapers alike. Newspapers rely on fair use to cover stories every day, regularly quoting for competitors as well. If AP starts to crack down on fair use, they’ll have to go after newspapers as well as new media…and that means costly lawsuits that again help kill newspapers.

Legal

Not everyone will allow AP to ignore existing copyright law and will continue to link or use fair use in reporting, and back up their rights with lawyers. Then throw in advocacy groups like the EFF and ACLU as well, all who will attack AP with their lawyers. AP will find itself tied up in multi-million dollar lawsuits that it may never be able to win.

AP using its muscle by ignoring existing laws may also see intervention from Government. Strong arm tactics that blatantly ignore law could see charges placed against AP on grounds such as racketeering.

Strengthening competitors

Newspapers and larger online outlets still need their wire content, and with AP content all but shunned online, competitors to AP become far more attractive. Reuters (which isn’t big in the US) and CNN are both in the process of increasing or rolling out wire services in the United States, services which are currently offered at far more competitive rates. Some media outlets have already quit AP, and with AP content offering less value online due to AP’s new policies, even more will follow.

AP will then find itself in an interesting position: with less members, AP has less income while at the same time spending increasingly large amounts on lawsuits as part of its war on links and fair use. If AP starts to lose money, it will have to increase charges, which will in turn drive more members to competing services…and around and around we go until AP is a shell of its former self and the wire service headlines on Google News came out of Reuters or CNN. Eventually AP dies.

Conclusion

It probably goes without saying that the AP is making a bat-shit crazy mistake here, but it’s bat-shit crazy for itself, not everyone else. AP is not the font of knowledge, nor does it exist in a vacuum in which there are no alternatives. Combine what AP is doing here and talk that many newspapers will start charging next year for access to content, and you’ve got the perfect storm for a dying industry that will rapidly see its numbers decline until few are left trading. As a small publisher I’m very much looking forward to the day.

Would someone please give the AP the facepalm

Steven Hodson — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 23:16:50 +0000

Even within archaic systems and services there are some that are even more out of touch with reality and do everything they can to perpetuate old and outdated ways of doing things. The Associated Press (AP) is one of those services and they have proven yet once again just how out of touch both they and management heavy news organizations are.

Rather than finding ways to make their content more useful, and as a result more valuable, they like much of the old media are struggling to find ways to keep everything within the existing status quo of where they control the dissemination of other people’s interpretation of the events happening around us – otherwise known as …. the news. Along those lines Dean Singleton, chairman of the AP Board of Director and vice chairman and CEO of MediaNews Group Inc (wow that’s a mouthful isn’t it), announced today that the AP would be creating a news registry that would allow them to tag and track all their content to make sure that ~~those useless lying sacks of industry destroying bloggers~~ everyone is in compliance of the AP “terms of use”.

The idea of course is that this way given their exclusive microformat the AP can control who can use their content and how much of that content they can use.

"The registry will employ a microformat for news developed by AP and which was endorsed two weeks ago by the Media Standards Trust, a London-based nonprofit research and development organization that has called on news organizations to adopt consistent news formats for online content," the announcement explained. "The microformat will essentially encapsulate AP and member content in an informational ‘wrapper’ that includes a digital permissions framework that lets publishers specify how their content is to be used online and which also supplies the critical information needed to track and monitor its usage."

The registry also will enable content owners and publishers to more effectively manage and control digital use of their content by providing detailed metrics on content consumption, payment services and enforcement support. It will support a variety of payment models, including pay walls.

Source: Editor & Publisher :: AP To Create Registry to ‘Track’ and Protect Online Content

As PaidContent noted on their post this is going to piss off a whole lot of people

This is sure to raise a howl from people who a) don’t like efforts to manage content use, b) don’t like the idea of tracking and c) don’t like anything AP does when it comes to trying to protect content. (We’ll also probably hear a lot about genies and bottles.) AP is trying to position it as not being about Google or bloggers, but about giving news orgs tools to enhance and protect revenue—and as an alternative to going completely behind a pay wall.

The AP paints itself further into a corner

Steven Hodson — Fri, 01 May 2009 17:47:59 +0000

I might not be the biggest Google fan around but there are some arguments used against the search giant that, even at face value, are ridiculous. Such is the case with the fight between the Associated Press (AP) and Google. On the one side we have a creaking antiquated organization that in of itself wouldn’t exist without the consent of the old media news organization claiming that Google is getting rich by stealing AP’s content. As far as Google is concerned all they are doing is the same thing they have always done – index the world’s information.

This argument that Google is stealing news content isn’t anything new. It is the same argument that is trotted out every time that some news mogul wraps his lips around a microphone. This was the case not long ago when the AP threaten legal, and legislative, action against all news aggregators as the AP attempted to shore up its business model.

Now Forbes is reporting that the Associated Press is back at it again. Why? because they want to develop what they call “news maps” but guess what – they will need Google’s help.

The AP, a 163-year-old cooperative owned by news organizations, won’t discuss its talks with Google, but plans to create landing pages and Web-based "news maps" directing users to original AP stories (and away from secondary sources who post material "borrowed" from the AP). To do this, the AP needs Google’s help. Most likely that means Google creating search protocols similar to those created from the licensing deal the AP inked with Google in 2006.

So what does the AP do during the negotiations with Google over content and compensation?

They threaten that if Google doesn’t strike the right deal with the AP, and soon, “They will not get our copy going forward.” Great way to influence and win friends eh.

The thing is that the AP might have been just the greatest thing to happen to the old med news business but the key word there is – have. Or, should that more appropriately be – has been, because that is what the organization is very quickly becoming. This is because the very news organizations that have filled the AP’s coffers are either having to re-evaluate their own use of the Associated Press or are going out of business.

At this point all the this bluster from the AP is nothing more than trying as hard as they can to keep their life support machines running by whatever method they can. What they don’t realize is that the plug to those machines are getting pulled making their days numbered.

AP issues C&D to AP affiliate for embedding official AP YouTube videos

Duncan Riley — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 00:16:41 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) have issued a cease and desist against an AP affiliate radio station over the station embedding official AP videos offered for embedding on YouTube.

AP said in its C&D to WTNQ-FM 104.9 in Lafollete, Tennessee that the videos breached AP’s copyright, and demanded that they be removed from the stations site. There’s two problems: the station is an AP affiliate and actually pays AP for access to the said content; second, the videos are offered on YouTube with embed codes and are free for anyone to use whether they are AP affiliates or not. YouTube allows content owners to disable embedding if they don’t want the content shared, AP itself had decided it wanted these videos shared.

If you thought AP’s attacks on websites earlier this week were bizarre, wait until we get to the next Pythonesque twist: AP’s legal arm claimed it knew nothing about the official AP YouTube channel, and continued to insist that the videos be removed.

Christian Grantham has the full story here, complete with an interview with the station owner.

The import takeaway is that AP is now threatening sites that embed its YouTube videos, irrespective of whether they are AP affiliates or not. We have AP video content from YouTube on The Inquisitr, as would many, many other sites, so there’s a decent chance that we’re all on a list somewhere in the AP legal department and could well end up receiving C&D’s as well.

The time for an AP boycott in nigh.

Newspapers Last Stand: AP declares war on fair use, blogs

Duncan Riley — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 00:27:23 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) has declared war on news aggregators and bloggers, in what could be the last stand for the newspaper industry.

In a speech at the AP General Meeting, AP Chairman Dean Singleton told the audience that “We can no longer stand by and watch others walk off with our work under misguided legal theories. We are mad as hell, and we are not going to take it any more.” Singleton said that “AP and its member newspapers must be paid fully and fairly” where other sites quote AP content, including portals.

The “misguided legal theories” Singleton is referring to is fair use, an enshrined doctrine under US copyright law (see the Wikipedia entry here.) We also already know what AP defines as “misappropriation:” anything more than five words, which is the level they set when they went after blogs in June 2008.

Most of the attention is focused on Google News and similar sites; AP and newspapers are running the line that news aggregators steal from them. But what should be more concerning is how they’ll come after blogs as well.

Dean Singleton was interviewed by Paid Content here:

What about us? We get along fairly well with AP when it comes to using the news service in our own reports. We link to stories on member or client sites, usually with attribution and without wholesale quoting. We ask directly for artwork when there’s something we’d like to use in a news story, as was the case with the photo accompanying this post. So I was a little taken aback when I asked Singleton what would happen to sites like ours: “I’ll leave that to the rules of engagement that we’ll be developing” in coming weeks. Not “we’re not after sites like yours” or “we’re looking at flagrant violators.” And no sign at all that AP will be reaching out beyond its members for input.

Time for another AP content boycott, and we’d love to see Google strip AP content out of Google News as well; despite what Singleton claims, there’s actually a world of news outside of the AP and its members, but there’s only one way to prove it.

AP fights back, sues Shepard Fairey

Duncan Riley — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 23:53:28 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) has countersued Shepard Fairey over its claim that Fairey breached AP’s copyright in his famous Obama Hope image.

The copyright dispute first emerged in early February, when AP issued a statement claiming that it was seeking compensation from Fairey for the use of the image, but was willing to negotiate a settlement and hoped for an out-of-court “amicable solution.” Fairey upped the ante less than a week later, by suing AP in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. That suit claimed that Fairey did not violate the copyright of the April 2006 AP photograph used as the base for the poster, because he dramatically changed the nature of the image.

According to AP’s suit filed today, Fairey knowingly “misappropriated the AP’s rights in that image.” The suit asks the court to award AP profits made off the image and damages.

While it may now be a muskets at dawn show down between the two parties, copyright protection from Fairey seems to be a when it suits him affair, with attendees at an exhibition of his works being prevented from taking pictures.

What ever the outcome, the precedent will have strong implications for fair and artistic use under copyright law in the United States.

Ironic: picture taking banned at Shepard Fairey exhibition

Duncan Riley — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 03:07:04 +0000

Obama Hope poster creator and street artist Shepard Fairey is the focus of a survey currently on at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art. Nothing out of the ordinary, except ironically, given he appropriates the work of others, you can’t take photos at the exhibition.

Christopher Knight, LA Times:

As soon as I snapped the photo above, a guard rushed over to admonish me that photography is not allowed in the show. “I’m not using a flash,” I replied. “Is that OK?” Nope, came the reply. “Must I obey?” I asked. “Yes,” she answered, missing or — more likely — ignoring my too-cute-by-half reference to Fairey’s trademark street-and-clothing campaign about authoritarian imagery, dubbed “Obey Giant.”

The guard was perfectly cordial and just doing her job. But I couldn’t help note the irony. A “no photographs” policy is in force in a show about an artist who is currently trading lawsuits over his guerrilla (meaning unauthorized) use of part of an Associated Press photographer’s published picture of Obama. I’m supportive of artists’ full participation in the “democracy of images” that seems to characterize our digital environment. I wonder what John Singleton Copley and John Quincy Adams would think?

Change you can believe in indeed

(img credit: LA Times)

Shepard Fairey suing AP over copyright allegations

Duncan Riley — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 00:07:15 +0000

Obama poster artist Shepard Fairey apparently doesn’t like allegations from AP that he breached their copyright with his iconic poster, so he’s suing them.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan says that Fairey did not violate the copyright of the April 2006 AP photograph used as the base for the poster, because he dramatically changed the nature of the image.

Lawyers for Fairey said he transformed the literal depiction into a “stunning, abstracted and idealized visual image that creates powerful new meaning and conveys a radically different message.”

AP said in a statement that it was “disappointed by the surprise filing.”

Notably, AP had not yet sued Fairey over the copyright issue, and had instead been in talks with Fairey’s lawyers.

The Huffington Post has more.

Shepard Fairey contributes to Earth Hour, accused of plagiarism by AP

Duncan Riley — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 00:45:15 +0000

Shepard Fairey, the artist behind the famous Obama Hope image has contributed to the upcoming Earth Hour campaign, as the AP accuses him of plagiarism for his Obama image.

Earth Hour is an environmental awareness campaign that asks people to switch off their lights at a set time to save energy. The idea started in Sydney in 2007, and has spread to 371 cities across 35 countries in 2008. The image from Fairey above will be used by the campaign to spread awareness of the event.

In related Fairey news, the Associated Press (AP) is demanding compensation from Fairey over his famed Obama Hope posters. The source image used in creating the poster was from an AP shot and was used without permission.

A spokesman for AP said in a statement that “The Associated Press has determined that the photograph used in the poster is an AP photo and that its use required permission. AP safeguards its assets and looks at these events on a case-by-case basis. We have reached out to Mr. Fairey’s attorney and are in discussions. We hope for an amicable solution.”

Fairey’s attorney said that they believed the use of the image falls under fair use, and Fairey did not receive any of the money raised from the use of the image.

(thx to John Johnston for the tip)

Reuters, Politico sign distribution agreement

Duncan Riley — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 00:32:51 +0000

Reuters and upstart syndication service Politico have signed a distribution agreement that will see both share content across their networks.

Politico content, primarily US political stories will be available alongside Reuters content to Reuters clients.

The more interesting part of the deal sees Reuters content offered for free to Politico members in return for ad placement. Politico currently offers a market unique service that allows member newspapers and online outlets to republish a limited number of Politico articles in return for ad placement with shared revenue. The new deal with Reuters sees the number extend to 10 articles and/ or image per day from Politico and Reuters available for free in return for ad placement. Reuters and Politico will split their share of the ads with end users.

Despite its strong global presence, Reuters has always been an underdog in the US market vs AP, primarily due to the ownership of AP coming from the newspapers themselves. Reuters only has 14 distribution agreements in the US, and with Politico on board now extends that reach by 60.

(via NY Times)

AP to cut 10% of workforce

Duncan Riley — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 22:47:11 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) plans to cut up to 10% of its workforce in 2009, or around 400 people.

Reuters quotes sources at AP who were present when AP Chief Executive Tom Curley delivered the news as part of a “town hall” meeting with employees. The cuts are said to be made to assist AP to cope “with tough financial times and ailing member newspapers.”

AP said in a statement that “All areas and ways of doing business are being reviewed. The AP, which recently instituted a strategic hiring freeze, may need to reduce staff over the next year. If so, it hopes to achieve much of the reduction through attrition.”

AP has made headlines this year as members have resigned or have considered doing so, including the Tribune Company.

No related posts.

AP backflips on membership rates, but will it be enough?

Duncan Riley — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 01:31:43 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) has backflipped on its decision to increase membership rates in 2009, a key factor in the growing list of papers seeking to terminate their AP content agreements.

AP said its board of directors had approved a “moratorium” on the rate increases and would “complete a review of its pricing and governance structure” by the middle of 2009 and carry out a review of its membership structure. In the meantime, AP will “provide all member newspapers complete access to all AP text content, at no extra cost.”

The move may decrease the growing surge of newspaper companies and individual newspapers leaving AP. The Tribune Company (Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and others) gave notice in mid October, and E.W. Scripps was said to be considering a similar move.

The decision by AP to not rise its rates at a time newspapers are bleeding readers and money, and at the start of the serious recession, obviously makes a lot of sense, but it doesn’t change one fundamental thing that will continue to drive down AP membership: newspapers are dying. As we reported today, the problems in the newspaper industry even go as far as the NY Times. Newspapers have to cut costs, and if they can find cheaper alternatives to AP, such as sharing content between papers, they will do so, and in some cases, already are.

(via AFP)

E.W. Scripps may drop AP: report

Duncan Riley — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 02:21:25 +0000

The E. W. Scripps Company, the Ohio based owner of 17 US newspapers including the Rocky Mountain News may be about to drop their agreement with the Associated Press (AP) for syndicated content, according to a report from Editor&Publisher.

The move would follow The Tribune Company giving the requisite 2 years notice last week, and a number of smaller players also dropping out.

E. W. Scripps would neither confirm nor deny the report. In an email to E&P, Scripps Vice President for Corporate Communications and Investor Relations Tim King would only say:

“At this point, all I’d be comfortable saying is that we are a member in good standing of the AP, but we have been engaged in discussions concerning pricing so the future is uncertain.”

Rocky Mountain News Editor and Publisher John Temple went on record saying the paper could survive without AP content.

“I think we are very close to being able to do so….I think there are different papers that could put out a paper without AP in different ways. I believe you can do it and satisfy the needs of your readers.”

Certainly sounds like they’re making plans already for when and if the decision is made.

The move away from AP continues as the economic outlook for newspapers in the United States worsens after an already rapid decline starting in 2006.

Tribune Company gives AP notice

Duncan Riley — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 02:12:43 +0000

The Tribune Company has given notice to the Associated Press (AP) that it no longer wishes to use its services.

The Tribune group includes the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the Sun Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale); The Orlando Sentinel; Red Eye (Chicago); the Hartford Courant; The Baltimore Sun; The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.), and The Daily Press (Newport News, Va.)

Under standard terms and conditions, AP members must provide a rather amazing 2 years notice for termination of content agreements, so the Tribune group will still have access to, and presumably will be using AP content for the next two years.

Editor & Publisher contributes the decision to a new AP pricing schedule announced in 2007, a move that wasn’t popular in the industry.

The Tribune Group isn’t the first to drop AP services, The Star Tribune of Minneapolis, The Bakersfield Californian, The Post Register of Idaho Falls, and The Yakima Herald-Republic and Wenatchee World have already given notice. E&P notes that The Spokesman-Review is trying to cut AP without the required two-year notice, aiming to be AP free by the end of the year.

The new rates don’t help the situation, but the broader economic outlook and the decline of the newspaper business is a bigger factor in the shift away from wire services. Newspapers already bleeding readers and advertisers prior to the economic crisis will now see an even more rapid decline than previously expected. Newspapers losing money have to cut costs, and as we wrote in September, wire services could and will be targeted, particularly as newspapers come to realize that they don’t need a middle man to exchange stories.

AP tries to put itself between newspaper content swap deals

Duncan Riley — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 03:09:42 +0000

The Associated Press (AP) has announced AP Marketplace, a new platform that offers AP content and more to AP members.

Marshall Kirkpatrick at ReadWriteWeb covers the content management aspects of the offering, describing it as an RSS reader type service for newsrooms, and PaidContent claims it’s in response to new competitors such as Politico. Both suggestions may hold some level of truth, but both miss the key line and what this is really in response to:

the Marketplace is built into AP’s innovative AP Exchange browser. It allows editors to search for AP stories, syndicated content and, now, content contributed by members.

and more (emphasis is mine)

Sharing regionally relevant and topical news is an area of great interest for many newspapers in many states, and the AP Member Marketplace is the fastest and most efficient way to make it possible.

and more

AP Member Marketplace provides the means for expansive cooperation among newsrooms. Newspapers in Florida have been using it to exchange stories of local and regional interest, for example.

and

AP Member Marketplace within AP Exchange takes the concept of the news cooperative in a new direction and gives members a competitive advantage on news of local or regional relevance.

Now lets flash back to The Inquisitr, September 10

the New Jersey’s Star-Ledger has published a full edition without using anything from AP, instead running lots of local stories and content from the Washington Post, LA Times, McClatchy, the Glouceseter County Times and Sportsticker.

and

What we are seeing is newspapers willing to work with one and other collectively to reduce costs by cutting out the middleman. A small start perhaps, but if it’s embraced, and newspapers realize that other papers aren’t their main threat, declining readership and subsequently revenues are, it’s the start of something bigger, and AP and Reuters are about to take a serious hit.

AP wants to put itself between newspapers that story share at a time newspapers are looking to cut costs by cutting AP and Reuters. In effect, AP becomes the ultimate middleman offering the best range of local content previously wasn’t available through AP, but would have been available through direct content swapping deals. By both offering the content, and tying up newspapers from doing direct deals themselves, AP’s overall product becomesmore appealing when newspapers consider dropping AP. Smart move from a company I noted in the earlier article isn’t completely stupid and who would fight hard to maintain its business. The CMS is the simply the window dressing, and Politico a bit player in what AP is thinking.