Dear AP: The Point Behind A Data Format Is To Make The Data Easier To Use, Not Harder

from the sigh dept

The Associated Press continues its attempt to convince the world to pretend the past still exists, while trying to dress it up in a modern dress. The latest move? It's releasing a new data format to append metadata to news articles. But, it's not to make that news more useful for others to build on, like most data formats. Instead, it's an attempt to make the news less useful, by including different tags on how the content can be used. This is backwards, of course. Data feeds and metadata are designed to add value to users, not take it away. This does the opposite. On top of that, this seems to be based on the idea that people should just agree to follow the usage rules. That probably won't fly. The way most of their content is used now is legal, it's just that the AP doesn't like it. But that doesn't mean anyone has to stop linking to them or quoting fair-use snippets from their articles, just because the AP says so.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: data, data format, journalism, usage
Companies: associated press


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2009 @ 7:03pm

    "But that doesn't mean anyone has to stop linking to them or quoting fair-use snippets from their articles, just because the AP says so."

    Stop linking to them, stop giving them publicity. Ignore them and don't report any news to them. Instead, report it to some blog that believes news should be freely distributed. Visit those blogs for news. Let the AP die from their own tactics. Don't pay any attention to them and don't feed them.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2009 @ 7:38pm

    They are completely delusional. Have you seen this at the end of the article: http://license.icopyright.net/rights/tag.act?tag=3.5721%3ficx_id=D99BPCMO0 ? Sending it in 5 mails is free, but you have to pay for more than that. How can they know? Easy, just pass laws so they can spy on your mail, just in case.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Brooks (profile), 10 Jul 2009 @ 8:10pm

      Re:

      Also note their bad math: it's $5 to send the article to 10 people, and $4.40 to send it to 11. It's $10 to send it to 25 people, and $7.80 to send it to 26. $15 for 50 recipients, $12.75 for 51.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    ScaredOfTheMan, 10 Jul 2009 @ 7:50pm

    Boycott the AP

    #1 is absolutely correct!

    I do it all the time... If I see the link is going to the AP or their static farms for other newspapers, I don't click it.

    Reuters usually has the same article or something close enough if you absolutely need it!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Brooks (profile), 10 Jul 2009 @ 8:51pm

    Not scalable enough

    So there's this very cool AP news story about bunnies:
    http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BUNNY_LADY?SITE=NYMID&SECTION=HOME&TEMPL ATE=DEFAULT

    I figured I'd email it to a bunch of my friends. 2,147,483,647 of them, to be exact (I've got a lot of friends).

    So sure, $322,122,547.05 seems like a small price to pay to send such great info to so many friends. Sadly, their site 500'd on me.

    So I went back and trimmed my recipient list to a mere 100,000,000 people, at a cost of $150,000,000. Still no go. 10,000,000 of my closest friends, for a bargain basement $15,000,000? That seemed to be processing, but then 500'd.

    I don't see the point of this service. Plus, it's unreliable.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Osno (profile), 11 Jul 2009 @ 5:13am

    iCopyright probably didn't test such an unusual functionality. They weren't expecting someone to actually try to pay!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    PrometheeFeu (profile), 11 Jul 2009 @ 11:51am

    Be fair Mike: "Tags identifying the author, publisher and other information - as well as any usage restrictions publishers hope to place on copyright-protected materials - would be packaged with each news article in a way that search engines can more easily identify."

    They also are packaging useful meta-data. And anyways, it's all voluntary enforcement anyways... All I have to do is ignore their tag and shazam, I didn't see the difference.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      CleverName, 12 Jul 2009 @ 7:01am

      Re:

      "it's all voluntary enforcement anyways"

      This argument does not hold water, it is a foot in the door.

      The internet is a communications medium, not content distribution. Industry big wigs are attempting to change and control it in order to extract more of your hard earned money. If allowed to continue, the internet will become similar to pay tv.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    zcat (profile), 12 Jul 2009 @ 10:51pm

    "copyright by default"

    As with all 'content', things are copyright by default even if they're made freely avaliable on the web, and I don't quite see why putting something in an rss/xml feed makes it any less copyright than just putting it up as ordinary html.

    Try applying this whole argument to Creative Commons for example; http://wiki.creativecommons.org/RDFa anyone? Are they also making content "less useful" by putting tags on such as 'share alike' or 'non-commercial'?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Pete Austin, 13 Jul 2009 @ 2:44am

    @AP Please could you amend your copy to include links to the specification, and include the full name so that I can search for it using Google. Otherwise how can I use it?

    I know you hate linking to your sources, but links really are essential if the Internet is to work properly.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    lrobbo (profile), 12 Jun 2012 @ 10:39am

    What is this link thing you speak of?

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.