The Associated Press has unveiled rate cuts to help member newspapers reeling from declining advertising revenue and said that it would sue websites that used its members’ articles without permission.
The changes the AP announced at its annual meeting in San Diego include a new $35 million in rate assessment reductions for 2010, on top of $30 million it had already instituted for 2009.
The AP further threatened to “pursue legal and legislative actions” against websites that do not properly license news content, and plans to develop a system to track its members’ news distributed online to determine whether it is being legally used.
“We can no longer stand by and watch others walk off with our work under misguided legal theories,” Singleton said…
While the AP did not name Google, many newspapers resent the popular search website because they say it siphons away ad revenue that should be going to their own websites instead of to sites like Google’s and Yahoo’s…
Some newspapers threatened to cancel their membership, prompting the AP to try to find ways to keep them. One new option the wire service is offering is a limited service for papers “with minimal world and national coverage needs.”
Google is a primo target – though, I wonder if they’ll take the RIAA path and sue individual bloggers?
Google makes billions by indexing and presenting other people’s work. A local library that “indexes” copyrighted materials actually pays the author for their work, their index is not like googles. In fact, now libraries mostly have internet as well for their “card catalogs”. Google copies and distributes and invades privacy worldwide, selling their ads, associating commercial products. Libraries don’t do this in card catalogs. It’s different for an individual blogger that is not associating products with their fair use of materials.
RIAA, MPAA, SCO, AP… all businesses/organizations that sue their end clients as a last ditch effort to stay on top/in business.
Yeah, this isn’t copyright violation as much as it is clearly Google abusing their monopoly at this point. They are abusing their search monopoly in advertising as well. In fact they have leveraged their monopoly into dominance in a half a dozen different markets now and don’t seem to be slowing down.
Sheesh, poor Mozilla all that time and effort to fight off Microsoft only to be killed off by Google… In a double cross..
Oh, sorry… Google isn’t really an end client… anyway, you get the idea.
I’m sure AP has the deepest pockets possible to sue everybody whom they think has harmed their dying dinosaur industry. Once again, another ancient information technology s about to bite the dust because THEY’RE NOT WILLING TO EMBRACE THE FUTURE, YA BIG DOPES!
Evolve or, die…your choice. The handwriting has been on the e-wall since computers went main stream and they chose to ignore its implications for their industry.
I can see the argument for the books archive, but
how is Google News stealing?
#6 – Who cares?
Maybe they should rename to Assholciated Press.
Google news directs you to the stupid newspapers site! It’s not like it’s taking AWAY business from some of these loser rags.
Now….the real pathetic thing here is that most newspapers are all AP content, to the point where they don’t even report local news, much, if at all. AP has done more to destroy newspapers than any other entity out there.
AP can suck ink.
Indexing is not stealing.
Linking is not stealing.
Both actually help others including the people providing the information.
Cut and pasting from other sources is stealing and if that is the case though on them.
I support Google, the big “G”, and their so-called monopoly. The AP needs to bite the dust and disappear.
#6.”If AP goes under…what takes its place?”. The mammals.
Google news doesn’t display ads and points to news sites. Not sure what the issue is — do these dinosaur newspaper folks even use the internet? Maybe the AP needs to go back to being Journalist instead of content police.
I would LOVE to see the AP try.
A lot of my friends are in the newspaper business. They are scared shitless. They really do think they are the only source of news. Their answers are 1) Government must subsidize newspapers, and 2) They must force all online content into a paid model.
I tell them that printed newspapers are dead, and I’ll never pay to read a local news website. I think my opinion is in the majority.
Well, Google is a tool that can help or hurt. Depends on who is using it. AP is just wasteing money because the MPA is already there. Just try to do something like test a video clip – bang your dead. The AP does not want to PAY for all that video they will need in order to compete.
My punch in the face by Google when quality testing today.
http://cagematch.dvorak.org/index.php/topic,6924.msg30042.html#msg30042
1 minute of vid which may in the end be 20 second clip to make a point must be cleared. I just deleted the idea and the video.
Seems like a lot of people don’t really understand the AP, and how valuable they actually are in reporting the news, locally, and from around around the world.
I fear what kind of news reporting there would be without the AP.
The AP might be going after people who take a newspaper article, and put their name on it. Which is not what Google does.
Nowhere in the article does the AP say they’re going after Google.
# 10 meetsy – Absolutely right. I read news from multiple sources and am getting increasingly tired of the same AP content just served up with different CSS layouts. AP news has become just licensed plagiarism. If everyone carries the same news verbatim, why do we need all the different outlets?
And do these news outlets realize they can tell the Google spider bots not to index all or portions of their sites? I do it on my personal site. But I guess they are too ignorant how the internetwebitubes work anyway…
Where does the AP get its stories?
That is what the newspaper reporters are worried about. There’s plenty of investigative reporting out there, NYT, Wash Post, Chi Trib, etc. Most large cities have papers with a bunch of reporters, out there keeping tabs on local government and more. Those people do the vast majority of the reporting and stories the Internet news sites leech from. What they do is central to our democracy…who’s going to do it if the papers fold? Will any online news organizations hire them? Will the government foxes go nuts once they realize there are no guards on the henhouse?
I hope some of you see that this is not an academic discussion, nor a pile of “I want mine free and immediate… and papers are what my dad reads.” Somebody needs to know how to file FOIAs, and hang out at police stations to get info, etc.
# 21 Olo Baggins of Bywater – also right on the money.
Speaking of which, how do you make money to pay for those employees in the New Economy the Interwebinettubes have wrought upon us?
That is the million dollar question so to speak.
People do link to newspaper articles without paying the writer.
People also do read writers web pages and blogs.
Newspapers should have listened and created their own Internet when they had a chance.
The train has already left the station.
We can search the Internet with any search engine. I started searching with Alta Vista then Dog Pile and now Google.
And so, the dinosaur does alot of thrashing about and roaring instead of evolving to meet environmental conditions, Can extinction be far?
I love the knee-jerk internet idealism in saying “THEY NEED TO EVOLVE!” Evolve to what? It’s information, not a movie or an album. Somebody makes money by researching, making mind-numbing amounts of phone calls, door-to-doors, working on contacts, and they get a piece of information that is valuable. If the method of distribution isn’t controlled and everybody has access to jump in and take it, there’s very little they can do short of placing ads in the actual text itself to continue making money. If there’s no money in an industry, that industry will vanish.
The only thing driving your conviction on this issue is your own greedy self-interest. You like not paying for shit and how dare anybody try to take that away from you?
I thought that PUBLIC knowledge, was PUBLIC and no copyright was allowed.
WONT they need to show that THEY, went out and PHYSICALLY gathered the information and that it ISNT public knowledge?
MIGHT make for better investigative newspapers..
Look this is the most important thing going on right now, but if you tell anyone I’m going to kick your butt!
#23,
Duh, they did. And news.google.com has illegally used their monopoly on search to to gain an advantage on the news feed business, in addition to dumping(they give their news feed away without paying AP association fees or sharing in the new collection activities).
This is basic anti-trust stuff. Also, the public would be ill served by all the news collection agencies going out of business, so this is a very clear example of consumers being hurt by a predatory monopoly.
For example Craigs list is not getting sued because they stayed within their market once they had a monopoly.
This is basically exactly the same reason all you freetards hate Microsoft with the giving of IE away for free etc. Only Google is giving news feeds away without paying the contributors the way the AP does.
So… If you are still holding a grudge against Microsoft you HAVE to hate Google even more.
ECA, no. Facts indeed aren’t copywritable, but a description and presentation of the facts certainly is. Heck, I recently wrote something about Ohm’s Law that’s copywritable, but it wouldn’t be easy to enforce because it’s probably impossible to write anything unique about it now.
For example, let’s say I read ten separate articles or firsthand reports about Michelle O squeezing the queen. I can probably then write an article about royal protocol that doesn’t infringe on anything, and it would be 100% legit, legally.
But, what does that approach say about me and the publisher of my article? A lot. Which is why the most “news” blogs and some “real” news organizations do just that, and they get away with it. Bylines and datelines are a way to prove you were a witness or spoke to someone who might be one, etc. They used to matter, and if you care about the legitimacy of your news, they still do.
But, if there are no reporters on the scene there is no way I’ll even know the event happened. That’s the risk of all these papers closing.
30,
You can copyright HOW a story is written.
But if a NUKE plant goes critical, THATS PUBLIC knowledge.
HOW congress votes is public knowledge.
HOW a shady deal was done by a MAJOR corp, is NEWS. It wasnt FREE to access or find the information..
We MIGHT get some NEWS thats worth reading with PUBLIC knowledge..
JUST because someone is willing to PRINT it in a newspaper, ISNT NEWS and ISNT copy protected.
#26 yeah right businesses don’t evolve, the government just needs to intervene because circumstances are so unfavorable, it just isn’t fair to these great big HUGE private interests. Idealist, sure I am, but at least I ain’t no pinko commie!