While the Associated Press made some noise recently about going after blogs that link to their content with an introductory snippet, the new Global Post online news site is actively inviting bloggers to link to their articles.
When I quote portions of news articles I try not to get abusive — I don’t copy the entire article; I quote a handful of sentences and invite my readers to “Read More” and provide a link. According to this New York Times article, though, many news media execs feel quoting small snippets like this and providing a link is a violation of copyright law and will “seek legal and legislative remedies against those who don’t” properly license the work.
The Global Post, a new online news portal with their own professional journalists and editors, however, actively seeks out bloggers to build traffic to their sites. Revenue seems to be from a combination of advertising with some paid “exclusive access” content as a value add. Global Post’s recent story on Lance Armstrong’s ‘Mysterious Bathroom Break’ by Mark Starr is disappointing, but I’ll keep an eye on them and give them a chance.
I’m a big believer in the news media as the Fourth Estate to watch over those in power. With newspapers going out of business and the remaining papers losing revenue, it’s interesting and encouraging to see new ventures likes this.
