Associated Press to pursue creation of rights clearinghouse to help news organizations license digital content

AP also will roll out a wider variety of private label apps

NEW YORK – The Associated Press is working with news providers to create a new rights clearinghouse that will enable broader and better access to original news reporting, AP President and CEO Tom Curley announced today at the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association meeting in Austin, Texas.

The AP Board of Directors directed AP to proceed with creation of an independent agency at its quarterly meeting last week.

“The clearinghouse will answer a need we heard from multiple businesses for an efficient mechanism to access content from a range of news providers for a variety of uses,” Curley said. “This extends to the news industry an approach that has worked successfully in other industries with similar challenges around digital usage.”

At the same time, AP is also expanding its development of white label apps and content modules for the growing array of handheld devices.

“Both of these initiatives address immediate, crucial needs of the news industry,“ said Curley. “They offer new revenue possibilities as news consumption patterns increasingly fragment.”

More than 70 AP member newspaper and broadcasters have already gone live with white label smart-phone apps developed by AP, in conjunction with Verve Wireless, Inc. AP also is working on private label iPad applications. Both leverage AP’s own award-winning AP Mobile platform, providing a complete content publishing and advertising system with no upfront development expense. AP is the only news organization providing white label apps that leverage a common content management system for all brands of devices.

Under the rights clearinghouse plan, AP and other news organizations would establish a separate entity that would provide rights clearance and privacy tools; a variety of ways to license content from publishers; and media intelligence services that would give insights to businesses about consumption of news content.

The clearinghouse would build on the capabilities of the AP News Registry, which allows participants to tag, track and measure use of their content online. Nearly 1,000 newspapers have signed up to participate. Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a favorable business review letter supporting the News Registry. AP will also seek guidance on the clearinghouse from the DOJ, according to Curley.


About The AP
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