[Gertie Keddle]

A.P. Cracks Down on Unpaid Use of Articles on Web
By RICHARD PEREZ-PENA
Published: July 23, 2009
NYTimes
Excerpt:

Taking a new hard line that news articles should not turn up on search engines and Web sites without permission, The Associated Press said Thursday that it would add software to each article that shows what limits apply to the rights to use it, and that notifies The A.P. about how the article is used.

Tom Curley, The A.P.’s president and chief executive, said the company’s position was that even minimal use of a news article online required a licensing agreement with the news organization that produced it. In an interview, he specifically cited references that include a headline and a link to an article, a standard practice of search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo, news aggregators and blogs.

Asked if that stance went further than The A.P. had gone before, he said, “That’s right.” The company envisions a campaign that goes far beyond The A.P., a nonprofit corporation. It wants the 1,400 American newspapers that own the company to join the effort and use its software.

“If someone can build multibillion-dollar businesses out of keywords, we can build multihundred-million businesses out of headlines, and we’re going to do that,” Mr. Curley said. The goal, he said, was not to have less use of the news articles, but to be paid for any use.

Search engines and news aggregators contend that their brief article citations fall under the legal principle of fair use. Executives at some news organizations have said they are reluctant to test the Internet boundaries of fair use, for fear that the courts would rule against them.

Mr. Curley declined to address the fair use question, or to say what action The A.P. would take against sites that use articles without licensing.

“We’re not picking the legal remedy today,” he said. “Let’s define the scope of the problem.”

Article

Apparently we're not even going to be able to link to AP stories.

[Bob the nobody]

The AP doesn't want any readers do they

[Doc]

I don't understand this.

Seems like a link to one of their articles brings them traffic. Isn't that the goal, to bring traffic to your website then have advertising on the site to finance your company? I understand not wanting whole articles posted because then there is no need to hit their sites. First time I've heard a company complain because Google was listing them. Most companies pay bunches of money for that.

It say's they're a non-profit corp., but then that they want to be paid for every article. How is it possible that the mother of all newswires is non-profit?

If they do make it pay to play, people will stop using them, I doubt many will pay online to read AP articles. Whatever... they mostly print B.S. articles anyway. Maybe the DNC will kick in.

Good catch Gertie

[katnapper]

Bye bye AP. Hello Reuters and AFP.

[cobalt-blue]

They seem to be cutting their own wrists here. But hey, they're biased anyway, so I say let them collapse under their own stupidity. I've never heard of a company that wrote articles that DIDN'T want them read.

[katnapper]

And the really stupid thing about it is half the time it is hard to tell that the article is AP. I have almost posted a couple of them lately but caught myself because there will be a sentence in it that says something to the effect "___ told the associated press" and then in the small print at the bottom it will say "the associated press contributed to this report". They are purposely not identifying themselves so that they can charge. Also not all of their photos are marked so that they are easily discernable.

[Slang]

I understand the need to protect intellectual property in order to make money, but I'm not sure this is the right solution. This reminds me of how the music industry cut off it's nose during the 90's because they took a hard ass approach to internet music downloading. Somehow, I think the AP will not get what they want form this move.

This post has been edited by Slang: 24 July 2009 - 08:06 PM

[knivek]

The AP further announced today that if a person read an AP news article off the AP web site, and thought about or even had an opinion on the article, or even thought about going to the AP web site, then they would be charged a fee.

Don't laugh, it looks like where they are going. Are the same clowns that came up with Obama's health plan in charge over at the AP?

After reading the article, it really does look like we should declare a complete moratorium on linking to AP stories.

This post has been edited by knivek: 24 July 2009 - 09:27 PM

[pict]

Executives at some news organizations have said they are reluctant to test the Internet boundaries of fair use, for fear that the courts would rule against them.

This is where they're going to screw up.

[USNJIMRET]

The AP further announced today that if a person read an AP news article off the AP web site, and thought about or even had an opinion on the article, or even thought about going to the AP web site, then they would be charged a fee.

Don't laugh, it looks like where they are going. Are the same clowns that came up with Obama's health plan in charge over at the AP?

After reading the article, it really does look like we should declare a complete moratorium on linking to AP stories.

Not that this is a democratic site, but I'd vote for that.
I avoid AP stories as much as possible.
Don't need to try and weed out the facts from the bias and willfull omissions.

[Taliesin]

Mod note: Take this article as fair warning then. There will be no more use of the Associated Press here at RN. Find someone else who's covering the story. No links, no titles, no articles.

[random_stuff]

Mod note: Take this article as fair warning then. There will be no more use of the Associated Press here at RN. Find someone else who's covering the story. No links, no titles, no articles.

No problem...

At some point they'll probably claim intellectual property of all words that have "ap" in them, so when you eat a Granny Smith, you have to pay them a royalty.

[Crabby Appleton]

I think this will be problematic for everyone. Since AP is so large, they have the resources to cover stories that other organizations cannot even hope to cover. As long as other organizations are willing to let AP do the legwork, they will become increasingly more dependent on the AP, and increasingly at risk for increases in AP licensing costs. The problem with monopolies is that they are less likely, due to a lack of competition, to provide the best services and products, and a monopoly in news sources is hardly likely to provide good, reliable, unbiased coverage. Further, smaller news organizations, blogs, and commentary sites, like RN, who do not have the resources to pay licensing fees will literally be prevented from commenting on news stories. If that is not censorship, it is darned close, and I wonder if AP's strategy would hold up in court. It would seem that some sort of fair use policy of news stories would make more sense.

[Slang]

I think this will be problematic for everyone. Since AP is so large, they have the resources to cover stories that other organizations cannot even hope to cover. As long as other organizations are willing to let AP do the legwork, they will become increasingly more dependent on the AP, and increasingly at risk for increases in AP licensing costs. The problem with monopolies is that they are less likely, due to a lack of competition, to provide the best services and products, and a monopoly in news sources is hardly likely to provide good, reliable, unbiased coverage. Further, smaller news organizations, blogs, and commentary sites, like RN, who do not have the resources to pay licensing fees will literally be prevented from commenting on news stories. If that is not censorship, it is darned close, and I wonder if AP's strategy would hold up in court. It would seem that some sort of fair use policy of news stories would make more sense.

Your right. We may have to start threads with, hey did you hear the one about.....

[Adam Smithee]

Mod note: Take this article as fair warning then. There will be no more use of the Associated Press here at RN. Find someone else who's covering the story. No links, no titles, no articles.

Alternatively, why don't we just find out what it would cost to 'license' AP articles, then calculate how that would factor into membership costs and see if it's "worth it" ?

I really don't have any heartburn over AP's position - I don't expect anybody to do anything for free.

This post has been edited by Adam Smithee: 25 July 2009 - 11:49 AM

[Crabby Appleton]

Alternatively, why don't we just find out what it would cost to 'license' AP articles, then calculate how that would factor into membership costs and see if it's "worth it" ?

I really don't have any heartburn over AP's position - I don't expect anybody to do anything for free.

There is a problem, however, in shutting down discussion of the events of the day. If this policy were to stand, doesn't it mean, quite literally, that a person or an organization would have to pay to express an opinion about events that only AP has covered?

[pict]

I'd take a guess they're doing it because their biased crap is being torn to shreads on the web. They don't like it, I say boycott their garbage and make them suffer.

This post has been edited by pict: 25 July 2009 - 01:02 PM

[Adam Smithee]

There is a problem, however, in shutting down discussion of the events of the day. If this policy were to stand, doesn't it mean, quite literally, that a person or an organization would have to pay to express an opinion about events that only AP has covered?

Nothing is stopping anybody from discussing any event. But if I want to quote an AP writer regarding that event, wherein AP has spent time and money covering that event and putting the quotable text together, then why shouldn't they be compensated for it ?

[ilja]

And the really stupid thing about it is half the time it is hard to tell that the article is AP. I have almost posted a couple of them lately but caught myself because there will be a sentence in it that says something to the effect "___ told the associated press" and then in the small print at the bottom it will say "the associated press contributed to this report". They are purposely not identifying themselves so that they can charge. Also not all of their photos are marked so that they are easily discernable.

Yeah, I've quote from AP article before without even realizing it until someone else pointed it out to me. Geeze, AP. I personally wish all the news organizations that subscribe to them would just quit after this. Let them do their own dang speading of their 'news'.

[Crabby Appleton]

Nothing is stopping anybody from discussing any event. But if I want to quote an AP writer regarding that event, wherein AP has spent time and money covering that event and putting the quotable text together, then why shouldn't they be compensated for it ?

I think you are being a bit too dismissive of what AP is attempting here. If a particular comment was reported only by AP, how can anyone discuss that comment without directly or indirectly referencing the AP report? It appears to me that, taken to its logical conclusion, AP could make the claim that comments made by newsmakers, and even events themselves, can be copyrighted and licensed by AP. If their position does not have a chilling effect on speech, explain what has just happened here at RN.