The Associated Press trying to remain relevant locally
May 10, 2008 by wemediaguru
The Associated Press has been going around to its members recently announcing some new technology and new ways it will distribute content.
I heard the announcement earlier this week at the Saxotech user conference in Tampa as the AP looks to integrate into Saxotech’s software platform.
This isn’t about more AP. It’s about a more relevant AP. It is all about finding new, smart ways to distribute content and make money on it.
I have to admit, I’m a little skeptical. I know we are all in this business to make money. But I wonder why the AP would put this statement out in this venue.
These changes will mean revenue stability for AP’s newsgathering efforts. Our members are currently getting about $600 million worth of journalism for about $108 million.
Anyway, on to the nuts and bolts. The big announcement was that the AP will allows its members to take advantage of a free classification platform for processing and enriching text, photos, graphics, audio and video. It’s a four step process that is said to take only a couple of minutes.
- Harvest - send your content to the AP for enrichment
- Enrich and index - the AP will then use its technology to classify, tag, and add meta data and so on to the content.
- Browse and select - the AP will allow its members to browse and the select which content to output.
- Distribute, integrate and use - the AP will offer various forms to distribute and use the enriched content.
The other news included in the announcement was the creation of a mobile news network, allowing members to have access to breaking news from all U.S. states and offering more content that media companies leverage in niche publications as they experiment in multiple niche areas.
I don’t know how relevant the AP will be in five years. Some of these changes are encouraging. But on a local level, I wonder how, specifically, these changes will help.
wemediaguru
Locally, I think the AP is barking up the wrong tree. A previous editor told me that his best front page had no AP on it at all, meaning that local stories were better than wire.
Readers know this, too. They know wire from local stories.
The AP should start focusing on what they do best: original reporting that no one else is doing. Politics, international, business trends.
In the end, they can’t compete with Google for distribution anymore. Why try?