Not realizing that mutual linking actually drives advertising revenue by boosting web traffic rather than detracts from it, the AP recently came out with a shockingly obtuse pricing scheme that purports to charge blogs up to $12.50 for as little as 5 excerpted words from an AP story.
Apart from the obvious and dubious legal veracity of such a proposition, the AP apparently failed to consider or conceive of the potential reciprocal effects of such a policy.
Prominent blogger Michelle Malkin recently calculated the amount the AP would owe her under its own pricing schedule for its quotation of her content to be $132,125.
She did the same calculation for Patterico and found the AP potentially owes that site $188,750 under the AP policy. Patterico commented on the AP’s use of Patterico’s content, remarking:
So am I going to be an a[$$] and threaten to charge them, or sue them, or demand that they remove the quotes? Of course not. They benefited from my content and I benefited from their link.
Thx to Michelle Malkin and Patterico’s Pontifications
