Published: August 03, 2009 in articles » management by Thomas Baekdal
Yesterday, Mashable got us up to speed on the latest strange move by Associated Press. Instead of doing sensible things, like embracing the modern world, focusing on creating better value, getting more people to use them and enhancing news by turning it into a social phenomenon... They decided to do the exact opposite.
Their latest ‘scheme' is to demand that everyone should pay if they use their content. Doesn't sound too bad, except that it even includes when you are merely quoting them. And the price is $12.5 for 5 words! ...Minimum.
Read "Quote 5 Words From the Associated Press? That'll Be $12.50" over at Mashable
This is the most insane thing I have ever heard.
The only reason why any news agency is capable of doing business, in the first place, is because they can quote and report on what other people are doing. Associated Press does this all the time. And as a news agency they feel that they have the rights to do this under ‘freedom of press' protection.
So how in the world can they demand that people pay when they quote them, but at the same time believe that AP should be able to quote others for free? And worse, how can they claim ownership of a quote that they simply reported?
When Associated Press quotes that Lance Armstrong said something on Twitter, how can they claim ownership of that? And more to the point, how much did they pay Lance Armstrong for that quote? He created it. He did all the work. Why are AP allowed to resell it, and worse, copyright it.
Another example is that Associated Press quite frequently quotes other sources. In their latest article about Tiger Woods, they wrote:
GolfWeek Magazine reported on its Web site that General Motors Co. would end the PGA Tour's longest partnership. GolfWeek also reported The Greenbrier in West Virginia is waiting for the PGA Tour to confirm it will replace the Buick Open in 2010.- AP
So AP didn't create this. GolfWeek did! They took it, and now they claim ownership. Did they pay for it? Did they buy the rights to resell it? No, of course not. They found something on a website, and used it. Then they added a little-bit of their own, and suddenly they claim ownership to the whole thing.
In another article about Global Warming, AP wrote:
"No one technology can do the job. The full portfolio of technologies is required", concludes the report by the Electric Power Research Institute, an independent research group partly funded by electric utilities.- AP
So what rights do they have to charge money for something other people made? What possible reason can they have for demanding money for words written by a research group? How much money did AP pay for the exclusive publication rights?
And more to the point, what if I found the same research report online, and decided to quote the same words from them. How can AP then possibly say that they own the rights to it? In this case, AP didn't write the words. I did. They just happened to be the same.
The number of ways this is ridiculous is simply staggering. If Associated Press succeeds in doing this, every news agency on the planet will go out of business.
It is like driving a car off a cliff, on purpose. It's suicide.
Destroying the ability to freely quote, refer and report on what other sources did, will eventually destroy the news agencies ability to create news in the first place.
In fact, under AP's new policy I am not allowed to write this article, unless I pay them $50 for the quotations. I am not allowed, as a journalist, to report the how ridiculous this is without paying the company who is being ridiculous.
And if this gets adopted in a wider scale, then everyone would suddenly demand that everyone else pays for the quotes they use. So when AP decides to write an article about Eric Schmidt leaves Apple's board of directors, then AP would have to pay Apple for quoting their website.
In the past, AP, and news agencies like them, could claim exclusivity. They were the only ones who could create and report the news. Every country even got laws protecting their actions.
In the modern world everyone is a reporter. Everyone is a creator. The only people who can claim exclusivity are the ones who were there when it happened. No news agency can claim ownership for content created by other people. Lance Armstrong owns his tweets, and no one can claim ownership for telling people about them.
In the modern world you have to be a creator, not a reporter. If you create news, then yes you can charge money for it. But if you are merely reporting it, then you are republishing other people's content.
When AP reports what someone said on Twitter, then they are no better, no more skilled, and no more valuable, than any other person on the planet doing the same - often in a blog.
These days, everyone is a reporter. And as such the price of reporting is zero.
I do not even own this article. The news was reported by Mashable, who got it from somewhere else. The quotes in it are the property of whom? GolfWeek? AP? EPRI? The Greenbrier? How many people have actually been involved in creating this article?
I can copyright this article as a whole (I created that), but the individual words? The quotes? The news itself? I do not own that. And quite frankly, I don't think anyone can claim ownership of it.
It's really kind of sad. I used to like Associated Press. But they just signed their own death certificate.
Coming up (later this week, or early next week): The Business of News in the Future
Writer, Social Media Advocate, Project Manager and Internet Manager
follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, or visit my website
George, I partly agree with you. But they are specifically listing it as anything down to 5 words.
My gut feeling tells me that their management team simply doesn't get it. They don't understand the change, and now they are trying to hang on to the old business models.
It like when the record companies fights innovation, so that they can keep selling CD's (instead of embracing much better distribution models).
Writer, Social Media Advocate, Project Manager and Internet Manager
follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, or visit my website
Associated Press: We Are Not Targeting Blogger.
http://mashable.com/2009/08/03/ap-bloggers/
Writer, Social Media Advocate, Project Manager and Internet Manager
follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, or visit my website
BTW: They still don't get it. But more about that in my next article :)
a few spellchecker mis-corrections... ridiculous != ridicules
Well, they sure are digging their own grave. Btw, what's up with the AdSense ad; I thought you didn't like Google ads? :P
This reminds me of when the Danish real estate agencies decided to demand money from people deep-linking to their websites. As did the Danish map-service "Krak" (like Google Maps) when you linked to their maps from your website. But as far as I remember that was in the last millennium. This is today.
This is absolutely BS. Everyone quotes everyone on the internet. Even AP does it.
Writer, Social Media Advocate, Project Manager and Internet Manager
follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, or visit my website
Brenton, Thanks!
Yousef, I got greedy :)
Thomas, or the recent Infopaq case:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/31/ecj_rules_11_word_snippets_can_violate_copyright/
Baekdal.com is (nearly) everywhere. Check out our social profiles:
FaceBook
Twitter
LinkedIn
YouTube
FriendFeed
Delicious
Aug 4
2009
George
visit my website
I think what's going on here is that AP, on their path to something that is quite reasonable, have purposely overreached to scare people. Let me explain.
If you read blogs, especially political ones, you'll see that it's a common practice among them to quote news articles almost in their entirety, or in the least most of them. This is not fair to the news business, such as AP.
According to fair use laws, anyone can quote a small portion of a news article without any problem, and I seriously doubt Associated Press will go after those who do this. I think they're after those who basically copy 25% of a news article onto their blog, something which is not acceptable.
Whatever the reason, bloggers and other writers need to get into the habit of paraphrasing and writing their own content based on what others have reported, instead of copying others' work wholesale which is quite common these days. It has evolved into quite a common and bad habit among many bloggers, and if they continue this laziness, they should have to pay!
Tips for bloggers: get in the habit of paraphrasing like you learned in school, quote only the important parts of an article that are the basis for what you're writing about, and avoid the wrath of the AP.