"AFP was reported to have barred its journalists from using Facebook or Wikipedia as sources. Or rather, it has told its reporters not to simply to rely on these sites the sole source for a story. Anyone in journalism will tell you that this is just good

"Australian cricket authorities came under fire on Friday for preventing some news organisations from covering the first test match against Sri Lanka, as a boycott of the event by international news groups continued."

Shane Richmond: "From a newsprint point of view wire copy makes perfect sense. It allows us to cover stories that we don’t have resources to cover ourselves. … Online, however, wire copy is redundant."

Yet again, an important reminder: Google News is a much smaller wire-service aggregating operation than Yahoo News. And MSN. And AOL.

AFP, one of more than 40 new organisations in dispute with the IRB over arrangements for covering the Rugby World Cup, threatened to pull out of reporting on the tournament.

"Publishers that routinely carry wire stories on their sites could lose traffic, affecting the prices they charge online advertisers".

"Josh Cohen, business product manager of Google News, said his company would consider eventually running advertising alongside the articles it is licensing from news agencies."

Google News will now link directly to stories by the news agencies Associated Press, Agence France-Presse, Press Association and the Canadian Press, rather than identical stories on newspapers’ web sites
.

“News agency Agence France-Presse has entered into a licensing deal with Google, ending the dispute between the two over AFP’s articles appearing on Google News.”