The AP's Desperate Attempt To Outlaw Search Engine Links

[rich_ord]

I wrote an article in WebProNews early this morning about the AP's announcement yesterday that they were ready for battle with any publisher, including Google who republishes their content. This includes even the slightest snippet, headline or possibly (since they mentioned the Drudge Report) even links.

The AP is ready to use any and all legal means to be compensated and will seek to enact legislation favorable to their position. If the AP is successful it could flip the concept of fair use on its head making snippets and links a permission based concept.

This could mean that all content creators that show up in a Google search result could be entitled to a share of their Google Adwords cash.

Here is a link to the article:

The AP's Desperate Attempt To Outlaw Search Engine Links

[Tubby]

The answer to this one depends on your belief system. it is probably in the same league as the gun lobby arguments, If you believe in Guns your intelligence will always find the answer to match the questions of those that do not.

I think, If you believe in search engines (I do not) You will always have an argument that will match the questions. .

As long as I am not contributing to paying for it. . I would love to see a few more legal pointers defining 'fair use'.

I would like to see a nice well defined narrow road defining 'fair use of content' I think we have a bush paddock full of traffic trampling over all and sundry at this point in time. .

If you can steal 10 cents off small publishers, and have them 'worship' you for sending you traffic. If you sit back with your cash recieved, and you publish Zilch content - something is twisted. YES!. . It is about time someone set the rules that separate, a facility to aid searching the net, and content.

[Martinscholes]

Ah! Bless AP! The poor things are trying to deal with today's problems with not yesterday's solutions but solutions from the day before yesterday!

What would happen, do you suppose, if AP win?

Websites using AP content would find that search engines refused to list them. Users of the World Wide Web would not be able to see the sites, therefore their income would dramatically drop.

They would cancel their subscription to AP services, so AP would, in turn, lose income. And quite possibly a lot of income.

Hey! Maybe Microsoft or Google will step in and buy AP?

[Tubby]

Martinscholes said
"Websites using AP content would find that search engines refused to list them."

NO. Websites using AP content would require permission.
NO. search engines will continue to seek out the precise content the searcher is seeking (that is their 'promise')

It should be easier to find content on the net if is only located where it is supposed to be. . . If it is AP content It should be a piece of cake to find it on the first attempt - .

Martin, shall put you in the 'FOR' section (believer in search engines)

This argument cannot be won either way. . The best we can hope for is some clarity on what can be legally stolen. (this can only be a good thing).

[Feydakin]

I have always had an "issue" with the way Google, or any search engine, takes without permission and demands that you be proactive about blocking them to keep them out.. Its the reverse of everything we were taught while growing up about 'borrowing' from people..

Its worse now with Google looking to use extended snippets with the express idea of "giving the user what they want without them ever leaving Google".. Now who is that good for?? The person that creates the content or Google and their shareholders??

[wige]

My big concern is any restriction on the right to link. They are talking about demanding royalties for putting the following text into a web page:

Last week, the AP ran a story about <a href="someapdomain.tld/some/story.php">something newsworthy</a> related to the topic of my web page.

This strikes me as being a criminal act, a direct violation of free speech. This isn't a quote, it is my own words in the text on my page. The AP doesn't own the URL, they license the domain name from ICANN and the file extension from IEEE (I believe) and the file structure is created by their CMS. Personally, I feel that this threat is an attempt at blackmail, and every executive on the board of the Associated Press should be brought up on federal racketeering and censorship charges.

FURTHERMORE, the Internet has a long standing and established, recognized and universally accepted principle that automated processes are allowed to access any content, and that providing access to spiders is implicitly granted and explicitly prohibited (through robots.txt) not the other way around. The method of telling bots that you do not want your content crawled has existed for over fifteen years. Ignoring that established and accepted practice and demanding money is the legal equivalent of putting up a sign on your front door that says "Open to the public" and then demanding that everyone who enters pay a fee or be arrested for trespassing. (That is a crime by the way)

JMHO

[Feydakin]

I would agree with you on the robots aspect wige, except when it comes to Google trying to use my content and keep people on their site rather than a 'fair use' aspect and redirecting some of that back too me.. That 'was' the deal for years.. Google seems to be changing the deal.. I only pray that they don't change it further..

The link you proposed will never be made illegal.. It is clearly fair use under long established law.. I believe that the royalties issue comes from all those ads Google plasters all around the results.. You know, the ones that they said would ruin any search engine back when sergy and page first wrote about their new search engine..

The Anatomy of a Search Engine

Appendix A:

we expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers.

[Tubby]

quote
"They are talking about demanding royalties for putting the following text into a web page:"

(whenever I asked for a pay rise I always started with a higher figure than I expected to get. )

[Martinscholes]

Originally Posted by Feydakin

I have always had an "issue" with the way Google, or any search engine, takes without permission and demands that you be proactive about blocking them to keep them out.. Its the reverse of everything we were taught while growing up about 'borrowing' from people..

Its worse now with Google looking to use extended snippets with the express idea of "giving the user what they want without them ever leaving Google".. Now who is that good for?? The person that creates the content or Google and their shareholders??

It is exactly the same with business directories. Databases of businesses are created without the businesses necessarily being consulted about having their details included.

I used to work for a business directory service and that is what happened. We only ever had one person call up to complain. Even though the listing was free and it generated business for them they demanded that their listing was removed.

[Martinscholes]

Aha! Here, in the AP's own words is the reason why:
FAQs | The Associated Press

[QUOTE ...AP serves 1,700 newspapers and 5,000 radio and television outlets in the United States as well as newspaper, radio and television subscribers internationally.

Over the past decade, AP has also sold a selection of its text, photo, audio and video reports to commercial online operations, both closed-end desktops (the Information Services business) and open Web sites (the Digital business). From the beginning, the objective has been to extract supplemental revenue from commercial markets to subsidize more newsgathering and other services for members. This policy has been regularly reviewed and reaffirmed by AP’s Board, mostly recently in 2005. [/QUOTE]

They want to sit back on their fat arses and, rather than generate income from their own publications or websites, they want to bleed us of the income from our websites and other people with websites and search engines, too!

[Feydakin]

Martin, there is a world of difference between listing my business in a directory, and taking my product, displaying it on your shelves, surrounding that product with my competitors product, making money off of using my product, and 'maybe' sending me a sale if people like it..

The doesn't want to necessarily bleed us, they want to bleed Google.. I have no problem with paying AP for using their content.. Or even part of their content, it is theirs after all..

[Martinscholes]

Feydakin, the implication is that they want to take part of the Adword/Adsense income. And its doubtful they'd stop there.

I expect they'll come to a deal. For many newspapers use Google Adsense adverts on their websites. So AP might find itself accidentally taking action against itself, as it is a co-op...