For months, the Associated Press and Google have been debating about content and compensation. They want to be paid by news aggregators which post up headlines and blurbs from AP stories without permission. 
The AP is also accusing Google of committing copyright thievery when it borrows material from news stories to assemble search rankings. So basically the AP wants Google to create search protocols that direct users to original AP stories and away from secondary sources who borrow material from the AP. This would not threaten Google's ability to search and link to newspaper sites that are AP members. What it affects is the ability of news.google.com to offer feeds of AP news.
In an interview with Forbes on Wednesday, AP Chief Tom Curley warned that if Google doesn't strike the right deal with AP soon, "They will not get our copy going forward."
Okay, so this is a blog and here's where my opinion comes in. The Huffington Post had a story on its website talking about this whole fiasco including Curley's statement from Forbes. At the end of the article there were 78 comments including this one from an anonymous source.
"The AP is a rag..or it would be it weren't a wire service. Look for Google to establish a competing service... amalgamating stringers is well within their capabilities, and their platform for dispensing information can't be rivaled. Look for AP to file bankruptcy in five years... no, wait. Murdoch will buy them up at pennies on the dollar...AP fits in his portfolio."
So I guess this guy and the other people commenting are basically saying down with the AP, who needs them? We can get our news from Perez Hilton for all we care. My coworker made a really good point. "AP is a not-for-profit, long-established and objective source of news. We want to throw that out for a corporate-owned news aggregator for a number of potentially bogus sources?"
And I'm going to end with this personal note: To me Google is like my childhood bully. The bully who came up to me every day in elementary school and called me "gap-toothed hippie" and then threatened to beat me up. Except this bully didn't make me broke.
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