AP Starts Whacking Use of Materials

Trace Sharp: The saga started yesterday when Frank Strovel of WTNQ-FM 104.9 in Lafollete, Tennessee was sent a cease and desist letter from the Associated Press regarding the embedded videos on the station’s website.

The issue is that WTNQ is an AP member. And so it began, as Strovel made various phone calls to the Associated Press asking what the deal was. The YouTube videos on the AP subscription channel have embed codes on each one for anyone to use.
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The question comes down to why the AP would send a cease and desist letter to one of it’s own affiliates? Why would AP upload videos with embeddable code to YouTube for use anywhere, and then draft a letter such as this?

Now we think that IP is an important matter which should be defended so as to encourge the production of more of the same. Otherwise the goose gets cooked and people stop making the widgets. But AP may have some problems. If AP falls under the same user agreement, they in posting the item(s) on YT may have forfeited some of their rights to exclusivity. (or at least how I read the agreement) –

6. Your User Submissions and Conduct

1. As a YouTube account holder you may submit video content (”User Videos”) and textual content (”User Comments”). User Videos and User Comments are collectively referred to as “User Submissions.” You understand that whether or not such User Submissions are published, YouTube does not guarantee any confidentiality with respect to any User Submissions.
2. You shall be solely responsible for your own User Submissions and the consequences of posting or publishing them. In connection with User Submissions, you affirm, represent, and/or warrant that: you own or have the necessary licenses, rights, consents, and permissions to use and authorize YouTube to use all patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright or other proprietary rights in and to any and all User Submissions to enable inclusion and use of the User Submissions in the manner contemplated by the Website and these Terms of Service.
3. For clarity, you retain all of your ownership rights in your User Submissions. However, by submitting User Submissions to YouTube, you hereby grant YouTube a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions in connection with the YouTube Website and YouTube’s (and its successors’ and affiliates’) business, including without limitation for promoting and redistributing part or all of the YouTube Website (and derivative works thereof) in any media formats and through any media channels. You also hereby grant each user of the YouTube Website a non-exclusive license to access your User Submissions through the Website, and to use, reproduce, distribute, display and perform such User Submissions as permitted through the functionality of the Website and under these Terms of Service. The above licenses granted by you in User Videos terminate within a commercially reasonable time after you remove or delete your User Videos from the YouTube Website. You understand and agree, however, that YouTube may retain, but not display, distribute, or perform, server copies of User Submissions that have been removed or deleted. The above licenses granted by you in User Comments are perpetual and irrevocable.

Bottom line? AP reserves the right to the materials as owner and may do with them as they wish. But by placing said materials on YT they have agreed to what looks like a nonexclusive right of distribution to anyone else (including YT) to do as they wish under redistribution. The fuzzy area is in the terms of what is a commercial application of the content. If the radio station is using the vids solely as a content item then they maybe free and clear. But as a promotional item for commercial purposes would be verboten.

What’s worse, the radio station getting whacked is an AP AFFILIATE!

Knoxville link.
YouTube’s terms of use.