The Associated Press wants bloggers to stop quoting passages from its news reports. At the risk of incurring their wrath, I’ll quote the spokesman:
Cutting and pasting a lot of content into a blog is not what we want to see. It is more consistent with the spirit of the Internet to link to content so people can read the whole thing in context.
In fact the AP sent letters to the Drudge Retort, asking it to take down several posts which contained quotations from A.P. articles ranging from 39 to 79 words.
But here’s the irony: Around the same time it was harassing bloggers, the AP published an article which lifted 154 words from a certain blog post.
Perhaps it is the AP’s position that only those who are not news professionals should have to pay for content. Of course I am shamelessly paraphrasing Glenn Reynolds here. Also have a look at the image below which I lifted directly from Bright and Early (who may have either lifted it from AP’s own website or simply made it up.)
Since the AP owns all the words in the English alphabet now, I guess I should start blogging in Eskimoish.
Muse Free 