Apparently while I was taking time off for my birthday, the blogosphere was abuzz with talk about the AP. And let me tell you, the talk as been less than kind to the Associated Press after the site decided that it would be thwacking bloggers for linking to AP stories.
Michael Arrington banned AP stories from TechCrunch, saying "...they don’t exist. We don’t see them, we don’t quote them, we don’t link to them."
In further looking into things that I missed on this I find where the AP turned right around and yanked content from TechCruch without a second thought to the fact that they have decided to charge bloggers for quoting them. ::blink blink:: Okay, so... we have to pay them, but they don't have to pay us? I think maybe the AP needs to take a quick look at who the media has been turning to for their ground reports before they start picking on the bloggers.
I'll be rooting for TechCrunch on this one, since I don't think it's fair for the AP to suddenly declare that they do not have to abide by the fair use laws of the copyright office and can instead charge bloggers $12.50 to use 5 words of an AP story with a link back to the AP. I don't have time to look up the actual copyright laws at the moment, but I do know I'll never again link to an AP story if creating a link to them is going to cost me $12.50. TYVM. I'll send what little traffic I have to my fellow bloggers and to other news organizations that are not against bloggers.
Hey -- does the blogosphere have a not-for-profit cooperative with an elected board of directors that we can have decide what to charge the AP when they use a blogger's ground report in their coverage of natural disasters and stuff like that? Just a though, I'll hush now and go get my work done. I promise.
0 comments:
Post a Comment