The Associated Press (AP) appears to have solved its legal conflict with ‘copyright-infringing’ bloggers today. The AP took disputed the issue of what constitutes ‘fair use’ content, specifically in regards to bloggers using quotes, excepts and titles from AP-owned articles, even if source citing is given.

Some weeks ago, The AP demanded that a US news and opinion site take down several stories because they too closely resembled stories owned by The AP. Today this issue was settled with the party in question out of court, and The AP stated that the outcome was “not a clear win for anyone, but also not a loss for anyone either”.

However, the issue of citation (and the demand from The AP stating that any content from its articles would require payment for publication) blew up worldwide in regards to blogging. The question was posed: at what point does reference become plagiarism? Many prominent bloggers from throughout the world defended their stance that summarising of content, when references to the source are provided, is a common and important way to spread news throughout the World Wide Web.

Where do you think the line is drawn in regards to posting on your New Zealand blog? Do you use direct content from other sources, summarised content, or are all of your words completely original thoughts and reports?

Image from Flickr.