NewsTechZilla » Associated Press

The Scorched Earth Campaign

Trace Sharp — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 12:03:50 +0000

S-Town Mike breaks the Associated Press’ recent antics down.

Segments of the mainstream media are obviously bent on turning the demise of their industry in to a witch-hunt, conducting a scorched earth campaign that even hurts their own. Rather than being reactionary, the AP needs to pause and develop constructive strategies for adapting to the rapidly changing conditions around them.

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Associated Press Fires Off Cease And Desist Letter

Trace Sharp — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 12:24:03 +0000

And here is the kicker, the newswire told an AP affiliate not to use its videos on it’s YouTube subscription channel, which have an embed code.

The saga started yesterday when Frank Strovel of WTNQ-FM 104.9 in Lafollete, Tennessee was sent a cease and desist letter from the Associated Press regarding the embedded videos on the station’s website.

The issue is that WTNQ is an AP member. And so it began, as Strovel made various phone calls to the Associated Press asking what the deal was. The YouTube videos on the AP subscription channel have embed codes on each one for anyone to use.

And WTNQ had a licensing fee with the Associated Press anyway.

Michael Silence saw the importance of the story yesterday afternoon during an exchange between our own Scott Adcox and Strovel on Twitter and posted the information on his blog No Silence Here.

Strovel wrote yesterday afternoon on Twitter:

FrankStrovel@sadcox They asked us to taken them down. I asked, “Why do you have a YouTube page w/ embed codes for websites?” Still… they said NO.

Strovel reported this morning on the Morning Browser hosted by Christian Grantham in a Skype interview that when he spoke to the vice-president of AP affiliates, that the staff member would have to “look into it.”

Apparently, this is one of the first instances to appear on the Tennessee radar as the New York Times is reporting that the Associated Press wants more control.

Taking aim at the way news is spread across the Internet, The Associated Press said on Monday that Web sites that used the work of news organizations must obtain permission and share revenue with them, and that it would take legal action against those that did not.

A.P. executives said they were concerned about a variety of news forums around the Web, including major search engines like Google and Yahoo and aggregators like the Drudge Report that link to news articles, smaller sites that sometimes reproduce articles whole, and companies that sell packaged news feeds.

They said they did not want to stop the appearance of articles around the Web, but to exercise some control over the practice and to profit from it.

H/T Jack Lail

The question comes down to why the AP would send a cease and desist letter to one of it’s own affiliates? Why would AP upload videos with embeddable code to YouTube for use anywhere, and then draft a letter such as this?

Strovel said one of his arguments back to the executive he spoke to yesterday was that the station had never had any problems such as this when they utilized CNN.

The Associated Press might want to take heed of that message regarding competitors such as CNN.

He also reported this morning that he would have a copy of the cease and desist letter available this afternoon and a statement on the how the radio station is dealing with this development.

Strovel’s personal blog is Left of the Dial.

You can also follow his FriendFeed here.

Amazing.

More as the story progresses …

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

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Say What?

Trace Sharp — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 22:42:54 +0000

Rex Hammock ponders on what the NYTimes is actually saying in a story about the AP.

According to this article on NYTimes.com, the Associated Press is “taking aim at major search engines like Google, Yahoo and their competitors” by demanding that Web sites obtain permission to use the work of The A.P. or its member newspapers.” However, I’ve tried reading the story a couple of times and I can’t figure out how this has anything to do with Google or Yahoo!. Maybe I just don’t get it.

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When Dinosaurs Smoked Cigarettes …

Trace Sharp — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 13:24:52 +0000

I’m going to wax nostalgic this morning as I’m wont to do.

Back in the days when dinosaurs smoked cigarettes and reporters typed their copy on Royal typewriters, there was basically a time lapse regarding when news was written and when it was delivered.

Those days are over.

People are twittering from airplane crashes, deaths of celebrities are hitting social media networks more quickly than mainstream media outlets can get it on their own websites or on television and the Associated Press has become somewhat irrelevant in recent years due to their own arrogance regarding the tubes on the Internet.

With that said, we need to be looking at small newspapers and radio stations in areas not commonly associated with big time news. Many dailies rely entirely too much on wire services to “fill their pages.” This attitude is lazy, of course, because people want news that impacts their daily lives. If everyone has the same news, why are we as consumers going to buy that product? This is, of course, something that many news outlets don’t talk about.

Having the same news and relying on wires is one of the gravest mistakes that newspapers are making and the issue comes down to what makes news unique because that is going to be key when readers pick up a newspaper.

At the paper I work at, we do not have the Associated Press, which I used to think was a disadvantage. Over time I have come to see that it is an asset as our news is focused on the community I live in. This, of course, makes the paper viable for the audience who are going to see their lives reflected in the local paper.

That’s the advantage and the selling point.

The main obstacle that many newspapers have at this point is finding that unique voice that makes a difference. For too long, we have relied on the easy path on filling our pages in our deadwood editions. Now, it’s a matter of the survival of the fittest as we see furloughs and layoffs around the country and social media networks beating mainstream news outlets.

People still want news. They just don’t want the same news as everyone else has. We are also not getting the lapse of time to present the news that we used to have, however, we adapted when 24/7 news channels started and we survived the onset of radio news broadcasting.

So what is next?

The question of the day as we start this new week out is what makes your product significant to your readers when they may be able to get their news somewhere else?Similar Posts:

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Is This A Slap In The Face To The AP?

Trace Sharp — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 15:48:25 +0000

Here we go:

Five big regional daily newspapers in New York and New Jersey, including The New York Daily News, have formed a content-sharing club, the Northeast Consortium, that allows them to borrow stories, photos, and graphics from each other.

Following announcements by several other newspaper publishers reaching new content-sharing agreements, the Northeast Consortium represents another threat to the Associated Press. Some AP members have already given withdrawal notice, citing the high costs associated with content from the news service, as well as membership fees.

I think we are going to be seeing a lot more of this in the future.Similar Posts:

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New Ways To Deliver The News

Trace Sharp — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 15:29:34 +0000

Angela Dice discusses an innovative way to share news costs through different news organizations on Wired Journalists.

So, here’s what I think might be the start of something that could work: A site that pulls in links, stories, etc. via RSS feeds from a group of newspapers and bloggers who’ve all agreed to the terms of the consortium (and pay basic hosting, IT and management fees). They each could set a base price for their stories based on categories, but have the ability to go in and increase (say for a long investigative piece) or decrease the cost. They also would be able to highlight articles

This is thinking outside of the box. There are two lines of thought I want to address.

First of all, Dice hits on the head the costs of the AP in her post which have always been an issue for smaller newspapers. The Associated Press is expensive as is hosting/IT costs. So this would be an innovative way to handle that dilemma. On the other hand, convincing publishers who are not Internet friendly is a task many of us are continually dealing with. There is still a great deal of “Us And Them” going on with publishers. Those ideas, however, will change significantly when there is a force of change, which in many ways, is happening right now.

The one challenge that editors/owners are also going to have to deal with is “The Scoop” and creating an online environment that promotes exceptional writing that demands attention.

One last thing, editors need the Angela Dices on their payroll because they are thinking of new ideas in this stormy economic climate.Similar Posts:

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