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AP and 28 News Groups To Collect Fees From Aggregators
jjp9999 writes "The Associated Press is launching the NewsRight project to make aggregators pay for content. Some of the top names in the news industry are currently on board, including New York Times Co. and Washington Post Co, and they're currently negotiating with Gannett, Tribune, Cox and News Corp. The project will license original news from the media companies and collect royalties from aggregators. The use of lawsuits and threats of lawsuits are already on the agenda. NewsRight's first salesperson starts work this week."
This is covered under Fair Use as one of the provision is reporting the news. Most RSS only provides a small snippet, enough to cover the basics of the story and is not subject to copyright.
NewsRight will target companies that “make heavy (and commercial) use of content originated elsewhere. They are being asked to become payers rather than free riders,” states Poynter.
What's wrong with this model? Its similar to how the FSF sues large commercial GPL violators because they breached copyright the FSF owned.
Although polls show that that most Americans want socialism, they just don't want it called that. "Down with socialism, save medicare" is the cry of many Americans. Don't ask me how you explain to them that medicare is socialism.
Work bio at MMWD
The problem is that it's well within the content providers ability to block legitimate sites from aggregating their content (see: robots.txt). They don't want to do that. Instead they want the benifit, _and_ want those sites to pay them.
Well I think its time they collect. AP, NYT and news agencies have people on the ground and they pay them to provide info. We as a free society (not the US only, all of occident), need this kind of setup to get information. Even if its slanted, at least the payment is for info itself, not for the slant.
If we leave this market untouched, then all we are going to hear about, is whatever advertisers are willing to pay for.... think about it.
NO SIG
NewsRight demands fees. Microsoft pays and pretends they're taking the moral high ground, in a complicated fashion that actually kicks the money back to them somehow. Other big aggregators tell them they'd rather just not include the content, and blacklist the NewsRight providers. Newsright finds some small 1-person website run by a disabled female veteran putting out news for the blind in a screen-reader friendly format, and sues her for One Millon Dollars. Streisand ensues, and Newsright crawls away with its tail between its legs. Meanwhile the members of Newsright cut side deals with the big aggregators and/or withdraw from the organization.
I read the news. A lot. The current system is broken. Look at sites like my.yahoo.com, which used to aggregate credible sources and provide links. I could choose a Reuters group, a Sports Illustrated group, Asia News, whatever. Clicking on a link would take me to a Reuters, eg, page. Now all the news links go to news.yahoo.com and give shit like this: http://news.yahoo.com/single-tuna-fetches-record-736k-japan-auction-040041043.html That's a yahoo.com page, with Yahoo links and ads all over it, with a small logo suggesting that the article came from AFP. Yahoo is eating AFP's lunch (and all the other people who do the work getting the news and writing it up). Parasitic is the best way to describe this. If this new venture can get good sources of news rewarded by collecting from aggregators then how does it make things worse? I'm completely in agreement with fair use; this ain't it.
The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures (Junius)
Step back from the question of copyright in the Internet age, fair use, quantity displayed, etc. Think about the meta-concepts, and it just doesn't feel right.
Here's how the free market that is all sunshine and puppies is supposed to work: Joe makes something that he thinks people will enjoy. He puts it out on the market, and asks for some price. Bill walks by and decides he'd like to have that thing. So he looks at the price, compares it to his perceived value, maybe makes a counter offer, eventually he gives Joe more than it cost Joe to make it, and gets a product that is worth more to Bill than it cost. They both win, and they both decide to do it of their own free will. They're both so pleased with the transaction that they start thinking of ways to make it happen again. Bill goes and collects more dollars (by starting his own thing-making operation). Joe uses that money to make more stuff (by going out and giving his dollars to other people who sell materials). It's this crazy self-catalyzing engine of productivity.
Now we have content. Bill decides not to pay the creator, but to profit from the content. It may be legal, but he's making a profit without paying the person who put the stuff together in the first place. Meanwhile, Joe doesn't start where he should, either. Instead of thinking, "Gee, there's a whole new way to distribute news. Maybe I could find a new way to package and sell this stuff. Maybe make it easier for new guys who are going to compete with Bill. Might even be a disruptive competitor will come along, pay me for access through this new system, and put Bill out of business. I should put out a press release saying that I'm looking to develop new kinds of relationships with entrepreneurs who are willing to pay for privileged access." No, instead of trying to innovate and compete Bill into irrelevance, he sues. I figure this largely boils down to Joe not wanting to develop a new product or new customers, he wants to take money from the companies that already have a lot of it because it is easier.
I can't see either side as being the noble bastion of what is in the best interests of advancing the progress of science and the useful arts. Seems like both sides are total ponces who should be tossed under the bus at earliest convenience. Bill not paying, and Joe not innovating -- they're both consigning themselves to certain death. If Bill were paying, Joe wouldn't be pissed off and looking for ways to sue. If Joe were coming up with ways to package and sell his media to partner distributors that was a value-add compared to scraping (and I can sit here and come up with half a dozen ways off the top of my head), he wouldn't be getting his lunch eaten by a total elimination of the operational principle that made copyright work (copying used to have a non-zero cost).
Right? Wrong? They're both idiots, and neither side has come up with a remotely acceptable answer to this new reality. The sooner we can get over our addiction to what worked 20 years ago and come up with some new answers for funding the creators of content, the better. Until then, this whole mess is fundamentally broken and I would rather see both sides crash and burn, see what comes from the ashes, than continue the charade that something good can come of this.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Why is it time they collect? I'd actually like to see some analysis that compared gained traffic from click-throughs, to lost traffic that only read the summary on the aggregator. Let the aggregators disconnect those participating news sites, and see who gets hurt more by the separation.
Mod parent down. Yes, the major news media outlets suck. We've known this for a long, long time now. However, anybody who has more than a passing familiarity with Ethanol-fueled knows he's an idiot, as further evidenced by his continued use of terms like ZOG (Zionist Occupation Government).
Seriously, take a couple of minutes and read through his post history. It'll either make you chuckle or make you cry, maybe both. I'm not saying he isn't right on occasion, but as the old saying goes, "even a broken clock is right twice a day."
There likely is an ulterior motive in this: Some of the media sources (uh...is Murdoch still on AP's board of directors?) and politicians (uh...all of 'em?) don't like the fact that it is so easy to prove that they're either lying now or lied at some point in the past. I.e., they'd like to eliminate your ability to pull both versions of "the truth" up and show them to the deluded.
You think the Wayback Machine will get an exemption?
I don't...guess if I'm right, that will tell you something.
There is another angle that involves creeping capitalism, the ability to hire unlimited numbers of lawyers, and the outright ownership of the highest court in the land: Once this precedent is set, how long before Google et al have to pay a fee to show previews and even links to content?
And finally...me, I'm not thrilled about a central clearinghouse for news distribution; the possibilities for censorship are absolutely disgusting.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
Well I think its time they collect. AP, NYT and news agencies have people on the ground and they pay them to provide info. We as a free society (not the US only, all of occident), need this kind of setup to get information. Even if its slanted, at least the payment is for info itself, not for the slant.
If you want to pay to support these guys, then get a subscription. Aggregators are just providing summaries with links back to the their websites with the full story. I really want Google to just delist all these guys from news.google.com in response. "Well, we're not going to pay you guys, but if you feel that it's unfair for us to grab this content from you, that's fine, we'll stop." Then they can immediately watch their page hits fall by 40% at least.
If anything, the news websites should pay aggregators to please include them.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.