AP

This story, via Kos, has me really scratching my head:

Here is another great moment in A.P. history. In its quest to become the RIAA of the newspaper industry, the A.P.’s executives and lawyers are beginning to match their counterparts in the music industry for cluelessness. A country radio station in Tennessee, WTNQ-FM, received a cease-and-desist letter from an A.P. vice president of affiliate relations for posting videos from the A.P.’s official Youtube channel on its Website.

You cannot make this stuff up. Forget for a moment that WTNQ is itself an A.P. affiliate and that the A.P. shouldn’t be harassing its own members. Apparently, nobody told the A.P. executive that the august news organization even has a YouTube channel which the A.P. itself controls, and that someone at the A.P. decided that it is probably a good idea to turn on the video embedding function on

So the AP is going after people for embedding videos that the AP puts on YouTube and makes embeddable. Forget the down right silliness of this, but there’s something even more interesting. How can they dictate how YouTube’s service is even used? Here’s section 6c of YouTube’s Terms of Service:

• For clarity, you retain all of your ownership rights in your User Submissions. However, by submitting User Submissions to YouTube, you hereby grant YouTube a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions in connection with the YouTube Website and YouTube's (and its successors' and affiliates') business, including without limitation for promoting and redistributing part or all of the YouTube Website (and derivative works thereof) in any media formats and through any media channels. You also hereby grant each user of the YouTube Website a non-exclusive license to access your User Submissions through the Website, and to use, reproduce, distribute, display and perform such User Submissions as permitted through the functionality of the Website and under these Terms of Service. The above licenses granted by you in User Videos terminate within a commercially reasonable time after you remove or delete your User Videos from the YouTube Website. You understand and agree, however, that YouTube may retain, but not display, distribute, or perform, server copies of User Submissions that have been removed or deleted. The above licenses granted by you in User Comments are perpetual and irrevocable.

(emphasis added)

Right there says that what the AP is doing is actually a violation of the terms of YouTube. Perhaps Google should pull the AP’s account for violation of their rules.

It sounds like the AP really needs some house cleaning from the top down. For starters, get rid of this executive, who is quick to go after people that actually pay them for their content. If I was an AP affiliate, I would seriously be reconsidering my agreement with them.

A small report by the AP about the growing trend of E-Cigarettes. They mention the fact that you can still get your nicotine addiction through the device, but fail to mention the fact that you aren’t getting all the other chemicals that plague traditional tobacco cigarettes.

Another thing they mention is the price. They claim it costs more than smoking. Actually that isn’t true. If you refill your cartridges, it costs much less than smoking, especially following the April 1 tax hike here in the U.S.

Check out this headline from the AP:

Democrats block GOP bid to extend DC vouchers

Hmmm – really sounds like some parliamentary move to stop the vote, like a filibuster or something. But read on:

The Senate voted 50-39 along mostly party lines to reject a bid by Nevada Republican Sen. John Ensign to extend the program beyond the 2009-2010 school year. That leaves in place a provision contained in a huge spending bill that requires Congress and the Washington, D.C. government to re-approve the program. Republicans say that is likely to kill it.

Ahhh so the measure failed by a standard vote, in which they didn’t get a majority.

Now if this was a Democratic bill that didn’t make it through, the headline would read more like “Democrats fail to get enough votes to pass …..”, even if they only have 59 votes.

So when it’s a filibuster, then it’s “not enough votes”, but when a measure just fails then it is “blocked”. Yeah that makes sense.

The AP has been becoming more and more vile in their claim of propriety. Last year they wanted people to pay a ridiculous amount of money to quote any of their articles and now, well they are going after the artist who made this famous poster:

On buttons, posters and Web sites, the image was everywhere during last year's presidential campaign: A pensive Barack Obama looking upward, as if to the future, splashed in a Warholesque red, white and blue and underlined with the caption HOPE.

Designed by Shepard Fairey, a Los-Angeles based street artist, the image has led to sales of hundreds of thousands of posters and stickers, has become so much in demand that copies signed by Fairey have been purchased for thousands of dollars on eBay.

The image, Fairey has acknowledged, is based on an Associated Press photograph, taken in April 2006 by Manny Garcia on assignment for the AP at the National Press Club in Washington.

The AP says it owns the copyright, and wants credit and compensation. Fairey disagrees.

"The Associated Press has determined that the photograph used in the poster is an AP photo and that its use required permission," the AP's director of media relations, Paul Colford, said in a statement.

"AP safeguards its assets and looks at these events on a case-by-case basis. We have reached out to Mr. Fairey's attorney and are in discussions. We hope for an amicable solution."

This is getting ridiculous. Perhaps all bloggers should unite and change their policies to fair use with accreditation, except for the AP.  We know they love stealing stuff from bloggers – so maybe it’s time to start fighting fire with fire.

This headline from the AP pings out the ironic-a-meter:

US anti-kidnapping expert kidnapped in Mexico

Such a serious story, with such irony in the headline that it strikes me as funny.

Ron Fournier, the Washington chief for the AP has published an "analysis" of Obama picking Biden. The headline alone tells it all:

Analysis: Biden pick shows lack of confidence

This is the kind of garbage the AP puts out, and also the kind Yahoo is keeping on top of their news page right now. It's amazing that people would consider this as some unbiased view given the history of Ron Fournier.

So does Fournier's article have any merit? Well to answer that we must be able to look into the future. Rumors have been out of McCain picking David Petraues as his running mate. Speaking in hyperbole, if McCain did that would that indicate the military is McCain's weakness? I doubt it, and you can be the right would be up in arms to even suggest it.

If Romney is picked, does that indicate McCain's weakness on economic issues? Again - no.

Let's also look at some of Fournier's past charms. Like when he wrote that Karl Rove needs to "keep up the fight", or how about when he was considered for a spot on team McCain?

This guy has proven a definite bias in the past towards the GOP and John McCain. How in the world can the AP publish an article by him as some unbiased view? Anything Fournier writes should conclude with "I'm John McCain and I approve this message".