Associated Press Digs Its Own Grave Deeper; Wants To Create Its Own Fair Use Rules
from the that's-not-how-it-works dept
On Friday, the story about the Associated Press threatening a blogger for using short snippets of AP stories with links back to the original as somehow being copyright infringement got a ton of attention. It was a clear case of the AP overstepping its bounds -- which goes against everything the organization claimed it would do. As more and more people complained, the AP figured it needed to do something to respond to the complaints -- though, it's choice of somethings proved rather ill-conceived.First, it went around to the various blogs that had responded to the AP's actions and posted a cut-and-paste comment on all of them. It's rather amusing that their own response to people cutting and pasting their articles is to cut and paste the identical comment everywhere. Of course, in doing so, that comment didn't actually engage with any of the blogs, and in our case, at least, referenced other blog posts that we had not referenced or even read. In other words, the AP reacted as if these various blogs were all working together as a single organization. We're not. Even worse, this comment included what amounted to a sales pitch, suggesting that bloggers should "license" AP content.
Second, the AP announced that it would "rethink" its policies about blogging and try to set guidelines for what is and what is not fair use quoting of its articles. Unfortunately for the Associated Press, that is not how copyright law works. The holder of the copyright does not get to decide what is fair use. That, after all, is the whole point of fair use -- that it doesn't involve the copyright holder in the first place.
Third, the AP chose not to stop demanding that the Drudge Retort take down the various blog posts it had sent DMCA notices over. In other words, despite this "rethinking" it's still pursuing the same brain-dead, internet-unfriendly policy. Clearly, no one over at the Associated Press realizes how badly they screwed this one up.
So, again, we'll reiterate what we said on Friday: on any AP story we find that is worthy of a post, we'll now actively search for alternative sources to receive the link. We won't totally rule out linking to the AP, but since it seems so against getting traffic from other sites, it will now be a link of last resort. It makes you wonder if the news organizations who license AP content (the ones who are the actual beneficiaries of these links) are going to start telling the AP to knock it off.
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Filed Under: associated press, bloggers, fair use
Companies: associated press
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Another case of misunderstanding copyright
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Re: Another case of misunderstanding copyright
/me gets ready to sue.
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To the Core
The article is written with the assumption that fair use is, in fact, up to the whim of the traditional news media, and not a bargain in which the American people are equal partners.
Just serves to show how deep the delusion goes...
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I suppose you mean Drudge Report, unless there is a parody site out there that I'm unaware of.
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Re: #5
There is a parady site out there that you are unaware of.
It was discussed in a post prior to this one. The takedown notices were sent to the drudge retort, not the druge report. =)
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Never Mind
Oops. Guess I should have read the whole thing before commenting
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Goodbye, AP
Techdirt, my response is the same as yours: I won't be linking to AP anymore unless there is a particularly compelling reason. Right now I can't think of anything that would make me feel like linking to them. Linking to AP would be rewarding bad behavior, and I see no reason to do that.
AP can do without the traffic we've been sending them. Meanwhile, we can support news sources run by people who do have brains.
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AFP is better, anyway
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Quick, someone write an app
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Woadan
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AP
They hate America even more... oops! That wasn't politically correct to say that. My Bad.
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Yes, and it's the customers who will complain to AP or stop using thier content... It's a long tail, but it should have some effect, at least.
Even if it has no effect, it's the principle of the matter.
Go, Techdirt.
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Wait a second...
*SLAP*
Get a clue. If AP's being stupid, you need to step up and link to AP's website to show them what they're doing is wrong and use fair use as your foundation.
By not linking, you're effectively giving them the power to dictate their rules and they'll think they've "won" in doing so.
Here, let me help:
http://www.ap.org/
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SEO 101
If so how can they not know that INBOUND links increase the visibility of their own site overall!
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AP
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AP
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Re
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