AP wants to charge bloggers for five-word snippets

[villager]

And thus, "free speech" becomes, more and more, a museum display phrase....

The Associated Press wants to charge you $12.50 to quote five words from them

The Associated Press, having already announced its intention to harrass bloggers who publish snippets as short as 39 words from AP stories, has now published a web form through which intimidated parties can give the AP money in return for “permission” to publish as few as five words.

In this spirit, I will shortly be putting up my own Web form through which people can PayPal me money in exchange for my promise to not blow up the moon.

The New York Times, an AP member organization, refers to this as an “attempt to define clear standards as to how much of its articles and broadcasts bloggers and Web sites can excerpt.” I suggest it’s better described as yet another attempt by a big media company to replace the established legal and social order with with a system of private law (the very definition of the word “privilege”) in which a few private organizations get to dictate to the rest of society what the rules will be. See also Virgin Media claiming the right to dictate to private citizens in Britain how they’re allowed to configure their home routers, or the new copyright bill being introduced in Canada, under which the international entertainment industry, rather than democratically-accountable representatives of the Canadian people, will get to define what does and doesn’t amount to proscribed “circumvention.” Hey, why have laws? Let’s just ask established businesses what kinds of behaviors they find inconvenient, and then send the police around to shut those behaviors down. Imagine the effort we’ll save.

Welcome to a world in which you won’t be able to effectively criticize the press, because you’ll be required to pay to quote as few as five words from what they publish.


<snip>

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/010341.html

[Ian David]

1. Didn't Rupert Murdoch or someone equally vile just join their Board of Directors? n/t

[Octafish]

2. I got five words for the AP...

AP Can Kiss My ASS

Fair use, anyone.

[krkaufman]

3. Sounds like it might be time to breakup the AP monopoly ...

... and a few others.

[Uncle Joe]

8. I second that motion. n/t

[rurallib]

4. funny thing is this could really backfire on them

if every one in the blogosphere quits using them, their exposure rate would go way down. Whoever replace AP as the go to news source (Mcclathy?) gets huge exposure.
edit to add NYT already tried something like this didn't it?

[donco6]

12. Exactly. They might as well say, . .

"we're going to charge anyone who even TALKS about one of our articles!"

How's that workin' out for ya?

[MercutioATC]

5. Fuck The Associated Press.

FOUR words.

[rug]

9. That will be $10.00.

[slipslidingaway]

6. Disassociative Disorder: Pushing Back Against AP's Heavy Hand

http://www.chris-floyd.com/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1

"...The boycott campaign urges bloggers to use other sources until AP calls off the dogs. My personal recommendation is McClatchy (formerly Knight-Ridder), which for years has been head and shoulders above any other American news service – and has now surpassed itself with a series laying bare the injustice and brutality of Bush's Terror War gulag. (More on this later.)

So check out "UnAssociated Press" – and check off AP from your list of linkees until they lay off."


http://www.unassociatedpress.net/

Blogger Boycott and Petition of Associated Press

User Rating: / 0

Blogs

"Click here to sign petition now! This is not about Left or Right - this is about Wrong - let's make multipartisan blogger buzz and let AP hear all political bloggers loud and clear! Banners are available below!

And use alternative sources (Agence France-Press, Reuters, McClatchy, or IPS for your blogger news and stop driving traffic to AP!"

[slipslidingaway]

7. Link... unassociated press

http://www.unassociatedpress.net/

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

10. How do they expect to enforce this?

Are they going to bring hundreds of suits for monetary damages throughout the world for any use of words from their stories on any web forum?

[villager]

11. Yeah -- won't hiring their lawyers for all those thousands of "cease and desist" letters...

...cost more than the "fees" they want?

[sandnsea]

13. It's fair use and they well know it

What idiots. Blogs are the best thing that's happened to the news since the radio.

[OutaTowner]

14. Next the AP will be...

..either charging kids to use their articles when they have Current Events homework in school, or the AP will want a cut of the grade the kids get on the assignment...