AP Makes Us An Offer We Can't Refuse

Get a load of this:

The AP’s disharmony with bloggers may have only just begun, as the
alternative it’s now offering to being served with takedown notices involves
paying an up-front sum for excerpting online articles — as few as five
words.

A meeting between the Associated Press’ Vice President for
Strategic Planning Jim Kennedy and Robert Cox, who heads the Media Bloggers
Association, is now planned for Thursday of this week. The subject at hand is
the AP’s attempt to find a new way of sharing AP content, which now involves a
fee per excerpt based on its word length.

On the heels of a blogosphere revolt last week because of its harsh
actions against social news site The Drudge Retort, the AP regrouped over the
weekend to take a less litigative — but more bureaucratic — approach to dealing
with those who wish to quote its material.

Where the group had previously invoked the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act and sent cease-and-desist orders to at least one blogger, seeking
the removal of excerpted content (in some cases as few as 17 words in length),
now the press service has attached an “Excerpt for Web Use” charge for passages
as short as five words in length.

The pricing scale for excerpting AP content begins at $12.50 for
5-25 words and goes as high as $100 for 251 words and up. Nonprofit
organizations and educational institutions enjoy a discounted rate.

As LGF commenter Mich-again says,

No problem. I'll just take their story and correct the grammar errors, and delete all the biased opinions posing as facts. They won't even recognize the story.