Local digital directors have long espoused the lunacy of sending our local content to AP so they can rewrite and drive traffic to the AP site when it should be coming to the local provider. When will local news orgs wake up and realize they are actually paying AP to have their news swiped from them on the web?

A tour bus flips over on a California highway. People are ejected out the window and off an overpass. 5 people dead, dozens seriously injured. When this news event happened, local media sprang into action providing a full-on onslaught of coverage.

In the immediate moments after the crash, the local stations efforts became the top items on major search engines. But an interesting thing happened as the day unfolded. AP picked up the story. So did CNN and all the news networks. Then the major newspapers picked up the AP story. Suddenly, Google and the other search engines started moving the AP stories up to the top. So, within an hour of the first report, the local media was pushed farther and farther down the queue. Because Google and the others use a proprietary algorithm that gives more weight to what they call “more credible” sources, anytime the big guys come in on something, they big foot the little guys out of the way. So the more traffic a site gets, the higher they show up.

That may work for finding static information, but it shouldn’t work that way for news. Almost always, the most accurate coverage – and newest information – comes from the local source, whether it’s traditional media or the neighborhood blogger. Within 5 minutes of the AP story being posted, the local guys were all but gone.

Why is that a problem? Well, at one point, the first 40 stories were all the SAME EXACT Associated Press wire copy, showing up on different media websites. AP didn’t update the story for hours. Meanwhile, the local media was updating the web story constantly. Dozens of new angles and side bar stories. Literally hundreds of updates to add new information, maps, graphics, slide shows, live streaming. Raw video, news conferences, aerial views. And none of it showed up on Google. OK, it actually did show up. But if you have to go 5 or 6 pages deep on a search to find it, does it really matter?

Under Google’s current algorithm, they were rewarding traditional media over currency and along the way suppressing enterprise report and accuracy. The first reports from the scene were that 10 people had died. That’s what AP reported, which is what the New York Times and the big boys reported. But shortly thereafter, the local media found out this wasn’t true. The number was reduced to 4 immediate fatalities and another death a little later. All the local media revised their stories again, but it was 4 hours before it hit AP and, in turn, the big guys.

Outhouses cushion small plane crash in Wash state
(from the Tacoma News-Tribune)
2 win Alaska betting game, guess river ice breakup
Police: driver caused $26K damages, arrested
(from the Fremont Tribune)
Couple arrested for sex on lawn at Windsor Castle
(from The Sun)
Cowboy ticketed for ‘riding under the influence’
(from KUSA-TV)
U of Oregon to Frisbee team: No pants, no season

This assertion is wildly inaccurate, as a check of any number of stories about the AP would have revealed.

AP sells only a selection of its staff-generated international and national news stories to Google and other commercial customers. A very small slice of this — less than 2 percent of the mix — comes from member newspapers, typically scoops that are credited to the papers.

Stories from member newspapers make up a much larger piece of AP’s state wires — but the state wires are not available to Google and others outside the AP membership.

Paul Colford
AP Director of Media Relations