“I wonder what percent of the news is simply gathered up from free sources already? It wouldn’t surprise me if the AP itself had to convert from paid subscriptions to sponsored advertisers in the not to distant future to survive too.”
Of real news, not the left wing PR BS, probably, a very large % comes individuals and free sources. That % is probably increasing each day.
A friend, who was a photographer for the Air Force and the local fishwrap before he retire a decade ago, hated AP. Apparently, they had some contractual right to whatever the local fishwrap published including any of his photos, which he didn’t get paid for nor did the story writer.
Apparently, much of AP’s so called journalism apparently comes from its customers. So as its customer base disappears, they will be more dependent on other “free/private” sources.
I have a couple of AP and UPI history books in my "to read" pile, so I'm not as educated on this as I should be.
The best I can tell of how the 'cooperative' deal between the AP and its subscribers works is that the AP is entitled to all original stuff from the members - news stories, photos, video, etc. Then the AP rearranges the paragraphs in the story, adds/deletes a few prepositions and then turns around and sells it back to the members.
The AP has a few reporters scattered around who do some original reporting sometimes. But the only thing going for them for so many years was their wire network that allowed information distribution among the members. Their own little internet, so to speak.
They're not long for this world.
Good points! Didn’t one of the networks just cut their ties to the AP in the last couple of months, I think it might have been CNN? I’ve always heard the service is rather expensive to subscribe to.
Speaking of the media, did you catch the gag story by Diane Sawyer last night where she was implying the world would be saved if each business hired at least one worker? And how many employees have all these networks canned in the last year?? BwwwwaaaaaHHHH!!