AP Wants To Become The ASCAP Of News

from the can't-think-of-many-worse-ideas dept

Thu, Oct 21st 2010 4:00am — Mike Masnick

Remember the Associated Press's bizarre and unworkable idea to DRM the news. Well, reader crcb alerts us to the news that the AP is now filling in more details, about how it effectively wants to become the ASCAP of news. Yeah, you read that right. Talk about bad ideas. I'm sure being like ASCAP is appealing from the AP's side, but it makes no sense at all from the publisher side -- especially given the details where the AP gets to keep a 20% cut of any revenue collected this way. As you read through the details, it's as if the folks behind it at the AP don't quite understand the very basic economics of content and the internet:

Curley indicated that the clearinghouse's biggest moneymaking opportunity is likely to be the licensing of copyright-protected content to mobile phones and an array of computer tablets such as Apple Inc.'s iPad and emerging competitors.

Huh? You license content to website or apps, not to platforms... This seems to have absolute disaster written all over it.

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Filed Under: drm, journalism, news
Companies: ap, ascap

27 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 21 Oct 2010 @ 5:32am

Blazing Saddles
This is like the desert tollbooth in Blazing Saddles. It will only work if people are stupid enough to go through it.
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- Richard (profile), 21 Oct 2010 @ 5:33am
  
  Re: Blazing Saddles
  Above comment is mine
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  - :Lobo Santo (profile), 21 Oct 2010 @ 5:56am
    
    Re: Re: Blazing Saddles
    (The comment above this one is not mine.)
    
    I'm sure Reuters is cheering AP on and goading them towards their most ludicrous goal...
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    - abc gum, 21 Oct 2010 @ 6:06am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Blazing Saddles
      What we need is an ASSCAP for farting cowboys
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- Anonymous Coward, 22 Oct 2010 @ 12:14pm
  
  Re: Blazing Saddles
  This is like the desert tollbooth in Blazing Saddles. It will only work if people are stupid enough to go through it.
  
  All you have to do is shoot the ones that try to go around it. That's where government enforcement comes in.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Oct 2010 @ 6:06am

Imagine every single blog and news outlet out there having to pay to tell the news :)
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skyrider, 21 Oct 2010 @ 6:06am

New APASCAP rallying cry:
Won't somebody please think of the artists?
The reporters?
The Children of the Reporters?
The Great-grand-sixth-cousin-of-the-children-of-the-reporters?????

Go to Congress with that mouthful.
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Steve R. (profile), 21 Oct 2010 @ 6:07am

False Value Creation
A common thread with many of the posts on TechDirt is the attempt of companies to establish tollbooths to extort revenue. Richard has pointed out, that it would be easy to get around these tollbooths. My concern, these tollbooths add nothing of value to our overall economy. They actually are a source of "friction" that is destructive to the economy.
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- MrWilson, 21 Oct 2010 @ 7:31am
  
  Re: False Value Creation
  Yeah, the only possible benefit of giving money to these people is the protection from their lawsuits, non-unlike giving protection money to mobsters.
  
  It just adds to the cost of business and makes corruption seem commonplace and therefore necessary and acceptable.
  
  It also seems that everyone who argues for such a right to extract payments as a matter of law and practice from anyone who might use their content or service always speaks as if they have confused themselves with the content or the service itself. It's a modern version of "I am the state." The AP thinks that if it disappeared tomorrow, so would the news. The RIAA thinks that if it disappeared tomorrow, musicians and artists would just quit making music. Same for the MPAA and movies.
  
  Okay, I don't think they actually think that. They know better, but that won't stop them from arguing that perspective because they want it codified into law that that is the case. If you think the parasite and the host are the same, you're not likely to kill the parasite to cure the host.
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Dave, 21 Oct 2010 @ 6:28am

Blazing ASCAP
Yeah, if their concept is anything like ASCAP, the idea is doomed. I commented before about ASCAP's complete cluelessness, having personally dealt with them.

I can see the big AP business meeting now.... some bozo in the marketing department just bought his first IPhone, he's all excited because he has this Great Idea. Hey, what if we charge every IPhone user who reads AP stuff. OH! He just read an article about these other cool new devices - he wrote down all their names, because if we charge every one of them, too, it's Even More Money! Wow! I can save publishing AND get a big bonus! Then I'll be able to score even more crack!
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- Anonymous Coward, 22 Oct 2010 @ 12:16pm
  
  Re: Blazing ASCAP
  Yeah, if their concept is anything like ASCAP, the idea is doomed. I commented before about ASCAP's complete cluelessness, having personally dealt with them.
  
  If you measure success by wealth, it seems to be working pretty well for ASCAP.
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fogbugzd (profile), 21 Oct 2010 @ 7:05am

hanging their hopes on the latest fad
Making money off mobile is the current fad. It is pretty late in the cycle, and by the time AP gets anything in place the platform will have been milked dry and consumers will have moved on. Major players always seem to base their plans on the assumption that the current market conditiions will last forever. They are like hopeful goldminers that showed up in 1850 instead of 1849. By the time they got there it was too late. AP should be trying to position itself to be there at the start of the new opportunities, not at the end of the current one.

Besides, the proposal would itself probably kill off mobile as a news platform or at least encourage consumers to find a way around AP sources.
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Hephaestus (profile), 21 Oct 2010 @ 7:16am

And the porn companies want to create an iTunes for their stuff ....

And the movie Studios want 30 days windows before netflix rents the films ...

And the record labels want to ... etc etc etc

Its really funny how correct David Wong is ...
FARTS--Forced ARTificial Scarcity
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Oct 2010 @ 7:52am

They have this delusion that people really want to pay for news. Also that everyone listening has to pay. FRAK THEM. We go underground.
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Anonymous Howard, Cowering, 21 Oct 2010 @ 10:05am

Lost in the wasteland
"Curley indicated..."

Now all we need is Larrey and Moee, and we'll have something worth watching.
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- Anonymous Coward, 21 Oct 2010 @ 1:42pm
  
  Re: Lost in the wasteland
  Like this from T-shirt Hell?
  
  http://tinyurl.com/27bfuqu
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Oct 2010 @ 10:11am

At first, I didn't read the title correctly and thought it said, "AP Wants To Become The ASSHAT Of News".... after reading the article, I think my first version was more accurate.
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Jeremy D Brooks, 21 Oct 2010 @ 10:36am

End State
Of course, this is where this discussion is heading. Don't use, discuss, or refer to my IP without a license. Again, a fundamental lack of understanding how them tubes work.
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Julian, 22 Oct 2010 @ 9:47am

John Pospisil is the ugliest geek in Australia, and the most bizarre and imbecilic. John Pospisil has a crazy website where he shows himself eating kangaroo cock. John Pospisil says he is the greatest brain to come out of Australia. John Pospisil certainly has the biggest mouth because John Pospisil takes the whole kangaroo cock in his mouth. John Pospisil is an ugly, old bald nobody from an ugly country of convicts, Australia.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Oct 2010 @ 12:24pm

AP Really Wants To Be Like ASCAP
AP doesn't pay the news creators, either. In other words, they just want to collect royalties without paying the creators. That's also a lot like ASCAP, isn't it?
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Myron, 5 Nov 2010 @ 2:41pm

John Pospisil has the dirtiest Australian cock that ever flunked a hard-on! John Pospisil sucks platypus cock all over Australia. His demented parents were criminals sent there because Australia is a Penal Colony of England. I saw John Pospisil's bald pate online and he is the ugliest geek to ever hump a kangaroo. John Pospisil can only screw kangaroos because even his gay nerdy boyfriends find him too repulsive. John Pospisil, head for Antarctica and suck walrus cock until your puny penis falls off!
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Vern402@aol.com, 27 Jan 2011 @ 2:21pm

John Pospisil is a descendant of Australian murderers sent to Australia by England in the 1800s. John Pospisil is a mean and vicious Jew who now declares he is an atheist. In addition to being an atheist, John Pospisil has said the Jewish race is nothing but a bunch of demonic satanists who should be evicted from Australia.
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Nathaniel, 4 Feb 2011 @ 11:07am

John Pospisil of TECH.BLORGE wears women's underpants and sucks Jew cock all over Australia. John Pospisil is a rapacious Jew who can bearly write his name. John Pospisil of TECH.BLORGE scratches his ass and wonders why he is rejected at all the gay bars he frequents. Look in the mirror, John, you are a freak!
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CalT, 3 Mar 2011 @ 2:56pm

John Pospisil is pretty ugly, even scary looking. He has an odd shaped, completely bald head. You can see how pin headed he is. I guess that explains his lack of gray matter. TECH.BLORGE is pathetic and boring. I guess that's all you can expect from a descendant of Australian murderers. Look at Julian Assange who is also from Australia. But for gross ugliness, nobody can beat John Pospisil. Even Australia is ashamed of him and wishes he would go to New Zealand, or anywhere but Australia.
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kikkiboy, 8 Mar 2011 @ 9:23am

John Pospisil is my anal slave because I always put a bag on his head when I fuck him. Where is this fuck Pospisil from -- Australia? What in the fuck is Australia? What in the fuck is TECH.BLORGE but a retard website run by a retard Australian creep.
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screwM, 17 Aug 2011 @ 3:46pm

John Pospisil isn't that ugly. Eric Goldman is a lot uglier and is bald as a beachball. I think Eric Goldman has bigger, thicker jew lips for sucking cock. However, John Pospisil definitely has the big, deformed jew butt! But both are members of the tribe, go Hebe!
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Melvin, 7 Jun 2012 @ 6:56am

John Pospisil is the Jew of the Year in Australian Kike Circles! Kikes in Australia are descended from Kike criminals banished to Australia by England. England is now a pawn of the Rothschilds because that ugly Kate Middleton is a Jew -- her mother is Carole Goldsmith, a Jew and an interloper. England is a Zionist Jew country.
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