If that’s not enough of a reason to watch, I don’t know what is:

The AP Twitter hack has prompted an FBI investigation, and has likely sped up Twitter’s plans to add an extra layer of account security with two-step verification.

“Thank you for your patience,” tweeted the @AP account early Wednesday morning.

Yesterday, around 1 pm ET, the @AP Twitter account tweeted: “Breaking: Two Explosions in the White House and Barack Obama is injured.” This was quickly confirmed by other AP Twitter accounts as well as AP employees to be bogus, and the AP soon confrimed that it had fallen victim to a hack.Following the hack, the Syrian Electronic Army took credit for it on Twitter. That main account has since been suspended. The FBI is conducting a full investigation into the incident.

The @ap Twitter account, which was suspended after being hacked, has been secured and is back up. Thank you for your patience. – @ericcarvin

— The Associated Press (@AP) April 24, 2013

Although the tweet was identified as fake in a matter of minutes, it had a terrifying effect on the stock market. After the false tweet claiming a White House explosion was sent, the Dow Jones industrial average sharply dropped 143 points. It quickly recovered.

But it just goes to show how powerful a tweet from the AP can be – really any high-profile tweet in general. What would happen if the next hacked tweet said something that was a little harder to disprove in a matter of minutes?

But if you follow the Associated Press’ official Twitter account, you might have seen some disturbing news to the contrary. Earlier this afternoon, the AP’s official Twitter account, @AP, tweeted this:

Breaking: Two Explosions in the White House and Barack Obama is injured.

It was quickly revealed to be the work of hackers, as AP staff began to tweet that the info was false. The AP has officially confirmed the hack, saying,

“Hackers compromised Twitter accounts of The Associated Press on Tuesday, sending out an erroneous tweet about an attack at the White House. The tweet said that there had been two explosions at the White House and President Barack Obama was injured. The attack on AP’s Twitter account and AP mobile app was preceded by a phishing attempt on AP’s corporate network.”

Also, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney says that the President is doing just fine.

As of 1:55 pm EST, @AP account has been suspended for further investigation.

UPDATE: It appears that the false tweet sent the Dow plunging for a brief moment. Here’s what the activity looked like today:

Just goes to show the power of Twitter as a breaking news source, even if that breaking news is pure BS.

Starting now, the AP Stylebook no longer supports the use of “illegal immigrant” to describe people living in the country illegally.

In fact, the AP Stylebook no longer allows for the use of the term “illegal” to describe any person. The word “illegal,” according to the AP, should only be used in reference to an illegal action – but not in reference to an actual person.

The AP had been using “illegal immigrant” for some time, after deciding that other popular terminology like “undocumented” failed to provide a credible alternative (they could have plenty of documents – just not the one that grants them citizenship).

Here’s what the Stylebook’s updated entry for “illegal immigration” says:

illegal immigration Entering or residing in a country in violation of civil or criminal law. Except in direct quotes essential to the story, use illegal only to refer to an action, not a person: illegal immigration, but not illegal immigrant. Acceptable variations include living in or entering a country illegally or without legal permission.

Except in direct quotations, do not use the terms illegal alien, an illegal, illegals or undocumented.

Do not describe people as violating immigration laws without attribution.

Specify wherever possible how someone entered the country illegally and from where. Crossed the border? Overstayed a visa? What nationality?

People who were brought into the country as children should not be described as having immigrated illegally. For people granted a temporary right to remain in the U.S. under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, use temporary resident status, with details on the program lower in the story.

So, according to the AP, people can enter the country illegally, but they are no longer to be referred to as illegal immigrants.

The move is already sparking political debate, with conservatives upset. The Media Research Council, who says their job is “exposing and combating the liberal media bias,” called the move “politically correct mumble.” Others claim the move had a purely political motivation.

On the other side, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus called the decision a “great move forward.”

For their part, the AP says that it’s all about “ridding the Stylebook of labels.” For instance, another move nixed the term “schizophrenic” and replaced it with “diagnosed with schizophrenia.”

[Photo via Thomas Hawk, Flickr]

Essentially, Meltwater’s service displays content with links and snippets in a similar format to Google News and other search engines and aggregators, which is why this case could have broader industry significance.

Last month, we saw newspapers like The New York Times, Gannet and McClatchy get on board with the AP.

Mike Masnick at TechDirt, who shares the court document, highlights a section where the court says:

“Next, Meltwater argues that the extent of its copying is justified because its purpose is to serve as a search engine. But, Meltwater has failed to show that it takes only that amount of material from AP’s articles that is necessary for it to function as a search engine. Indeed, the evidence is compellingly to the contrary.”

Masnick writes that the court “seems to think it knows how to run a search engine,” adding, “I’m curious. What is ‘the amount necessary to function as a search engine?’ One might reasonably suggest that a search engine would be wise to index everything. Yet the court here seems to be suggesting otherwise. I’m curious how many search engines the judge has built.”

“Basically, Meltwater points out that what it does is no different than a search engine, and the court says (without much basis) that it doesn’t think Meltwater really is a search engine, and thus these defenses don’t apply,” he adds. “But this is extremely troubling for actual search engines, because you can take each of the pieces out and then try to apply them to a basic search engine, and you’ll find that if this ruling stands, it makes being a search engine much more difficult as well.”

Meltwater will of course be appealing the judge’s decision. AFP quotes CEO Jorn Lyseggen as saying, “We’re disappointed by the court’s decision and we strongly disagree with it. We’re considering all of our options, but we look forward to having this decision reviewed by the Court of Appeals, which we are confident will see the case in a different way.”

The TImes filed a brief with the court, calling Meltwater a “free-rider,” which engages in the “wholesale copying and redistribution” of its news reports.The brief is also endorsed by other publishers including Gannett and McClatchy (via PaidContent).

As described on its site, Meltwater offers a product that tracks keywords, phrases, and topics in over 192,000 sources from over 190 countries and 100 languages, and monitors these sources consistently throughout the day. It searches an unlimited amount of keywords throughout the publications, and lets customers receieve daily reports at the timing and frequency of their choosing, “collated into easily digested categories,” as the company describes it.

Interestingly, the brief paints Google News in a positive light, at least in comparison to Meltwater. The publishers claim that the rate of clickthrough is much greater with Google News and similar services than it is for Meltwater.

TechDirt reported on the battle between the AP and Meltwater as far back as last April, saying that if the AP’s argument gains traction, it could “effectively outlaw search engines”. Mike Masnick shared this statement from Meltwater at the time:

Plaintiff’s claims are barred in whole or in part by the doctrine of copyright misuse. Through this Complaint and through other means, Plaintiff seeks to misuse its limited copyright monopoly to extend its control over the Internet search market more generally, thereby improperly expanding the protections afforded by U.S. copyright law. Among other things, AP has misused its copyright monopoly by demanding that third parties take licenses for search results, which do not require a license under U.S. copyright law, and AP has also formed a consortium (called NewsRight) with the purpose of further misusing its copyright monopoly to extract licensing fees that exceed what the law allows.

We’ve discussed Newsright in the past.

Meltwater has actually filed a counter-suit against the AP on the grounds of libel, and has the support of the EFF, and as Jeff John Roberts at PaidContent points out, even the Google-backed Computer and Communications Industry Association has backed Meltwater’s claim that it’s a search engine. He shares the NYT Amicus Brief:

NYT Amicus Brief for Meltwater by

Earlier this month, Meltwater issued a press release saying it was taking the fight to protect Internet users from unintentionally infringing copyright law.

While that was largely the point of the article, we also noticed that some of the sites running the AP story had bit.ly URLs, which pointed to the original source, but didn’t actually link. Rather than linking some anchor text, it just had the URL in parentheses, which seems odd to me. Anyway, some of the sites actually linked the URL and some didn’t. The AP pointed out to us that they link it on their own site, and don’t control whether or not the other sites link.

Since backlinks are a pretty significant factor in building credibility on the web, I thought it would seem appropriate to make it a policy that sites running the AP’s content with links to other sources, be required to keep those links in tact. I asked Director of AP Media Relations Paul Colford why the AP does’t make this a policy. Here’s what he says:

As a cooperative and as a provider of services to our members and commercial customers (that is, we deliver text, photos, video, graphics etc. to papers large and small, broadcasters large and small, plus websites etc., which then consider our goods for their own needs and presentations), we don’t dictate how they utilize the material, or deal with links for that matter. The choices are theirs.

Moreover, I’m told that longer links have a tendency to break for any number of reasons; some links contain characters that transmit unevenly downstream. Which is why we also use bit.ly.

The bit.ly thing I get, although it does mask the domain it’s referring to.

Linking to your sources is common web etiquette. The AP gets this, clearly. They do it on their own properties, and incude the link (although I still don’t see why they don’t just link anchor text like most other news organizations). But apparently sites running AP content aren’t required to keep this etiquette in place.

The AP basically just wanted to be paid for any use of their content, even if that means linking. Besides search engines, Drudge Report was specifically named in a NYT piece on the topic. All that site does is link. Not even with snippets.

With that in mind, it seems the AP would not be too keen on a blog or other news publication referencing an AP story on a topic, even with a link. But then you see the AP putting out something like this. I’d like to screen cap it, but I don’t want the AP to be able to say I’m reproducing their article. You can click the link and look at it if you want, but I’ll describe it.

It’s a six-sentence-long article about a man suing the maker of Assassin’s Creed. It’s based on a report from The Carlisle Sentinel (which is much longer). It mentions the publication, and includes the URL in parentheses. It has little to no added value compared to the original piece. It seems like the kind of thing, that if the AP’s and Carlisle Sentinel’s roles were reversed, the AP wouldn’t be very happy with.

A few interesting points about the AP’s linking strategy here:

1. Why put the URL in parentheses rather than just link some anchor text like the rest fo the web does?

2. The URL isn’t even a clickable link. The user would have to copy and paste it into their address bar.

3. The URL is a bit.ly URL, so you can’t even see the site’s domain it is pointing to.

At least when a blogger links to an AP story, it can potentially drive referrals to the original piece.

Update: The AP points out that they do provide links in the stories on their own site. “Of course, the AP puts links in copy. They work on some downstream sites, not others, and they work on our own sites,” Paul Colford, the AP’s Director of Media Relations, tells WebProNews. He points to the referenced article on the AP’s site.

Colford also makes a point to note that the “AP’s unique pedigree as a cooperative, owned by its 1,500 or so member newspapers, some of whose stories we rewrite for our state wires (and a tiny fraction of these, such as big exclusives, also end up in the online feed licensed by our commercial customers, including the portals).”

The Sentinel’s piece has 0 comments. 0 tweets. 0 Facebook recommendations. The Yahoo News page featuring the AP’s version has 192 comments alone.

We contacted the AP about its policy on linking. We asked: If a blog wrote an article, which was six sentences long, and one of those sentences was referencing an AP report (with a link), would this be acceptable to the AP?

The AP’s Gloria Sullivan responded, “This is what I know…no wording can be changed in any AP article, no article can be summarized or altered in any way…but you can link to an AP article (say if you are referencing or referring to something).”

“Of course, this is not encouraged,” she added.

To clarify, we asked: Linking to an AP article when referencing or referring to something is not encouraged?

“In all honesty, we don’t earn revenue when someone links to an AP article, so I don’t really go around posting a billboard for people to do it (if you get my drift),” she said. “But you have permission.”

There you have it. The AP gives you permission to link.

The winners were Rebecca Rolfe, John Osborn, Katie Zhu, Emily Eggleston, Reginald James, and Kevin Schaul. You can view profiles of their submissions including YouTube videos here.

John Osborn is a graduate student at Berkeley and says “The most effective way to truly understand anything is to experience it” and this is one of the main reasons why he wants to become a journalist.

Kevin Schaul is a sophomore at the University of Minnesota. He will use his scholarship to focus on the computer science end of journalsim and states that, “Computaional tools can help us answer once unthinkable questions, become more productive, and tell better stories. And that is what journalism is all about.”

According to Google’s official blog for the contest these intellectuals:

“Have big plans that range from producing hyperlocal data-driven stories, to developing open-source apps that allow for democratic news gathering and greater collaboration, to data visualization for current events and entertainment, to producing political news games and teaching journalists how to code.”

Is it fair to say that Google gave students attending institutions in the suburbs less preference?

The following is a statement from the contest’s website:

“Students from diverse backgrounds, as well as those attending rural-area institutions, are strongly encouraged to apply.”

Why do you think this is? What is the purpose?

The Associated Press is about to enter a new era, as its President and CEO Tom Curley steps down. This was announced late last month, along with the fact that the AP began a search for his replacement. He’ll stick around until that replacement is found.

The AP and the web have had something of a rocky relationship, as the news industry as a whole has felt the effects of the increasing rapidity of news. The relationship even saw the AP’s content absent from Google News at one point, before it ultimately reached a new licensing deal with the search giant. Under Curley’s reign, the AP has been very stingy at times about how others engage with their content, in terms of referencing, quoting, linking, etc. It’s going to be very interesting to see how the organization evolves under new management.

Should sites referencing or linking to AP content have to pay for the privilege to do so? Let us now what you think.

The Guardian ran an interview with Curley this week, in which he talks about some of these issues, and the challenges that his replacement will face.

Curley talked about how much shorter the news cycle (which he defines as the “period of time when all the people interested in a story had access to it”) is these days, compared to the 60s. From 12 hours, to just a few minutes. “I would say until about 11 September 2001 it was three hours,” he’s quoted as saying. “Now it’s 30 minutes. You might say if you are a certain age – with Twitter and Facebook and all that type of stuff – it’s three minutes.”

I’m not sure I agree with that. I’m pretty sure you have access to news on the web as long as it’s on the web. Whether you’re perusing sites’ archives, searching on Google, digging back through past Facebook posts, or through the Twitter timeline, access is generally there. There are certainly some exceptions to the rule, but just because the news comes in quick and plentiful, does not mean it disappears just as quickly.

“If we can win by two minutes, on just about every story we can charge a premium,” he’s quoted as saying. “Driving faster and faster is what we are still focused on. That hasn’t changed.”

And the AP is still getting trumped by social media. As you have probably heard, Singer Whitney Houston passed away last weekend. The AP didn’t break this. Twitter broke this. Here is the breaking tweet:

The AP recognizes the importance of social media though. The AP has broken stories on Twitter before running reports. It’s interesting that the BBC seems to frown upon this.

With social media services like Twitter (or Facebook, Google+ and others…even blogs), the actual eye witness gets to break the story in many cases. Users can get it straight from the source.

However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t a need for the news agency like the AP. You’re probably aware of the phenomenon where false death rumors keep popping up on Twitter. Someone has to separate the fact from the fiction. This could be the AP, or any other news agency. However, it could also, again be Twitter. It just depends on who’s tweeting. If Whitney Houston’s publicist tweeted that Houston was really alive, that probably would’ve been authoritative enough for most people, as long as they saw it. Not everyone follows Houston’s publicist, or knows who he/she is, however. If I referenced the tweet, my readers that trust me may have taken my word. Likewise for the AP. I’m not comparing myself to the AP. It’s just a matter of readers trusting where they’re getting their info, whether that be from someone they follow on Twitter, a blog they read or an old school media organization. The channel itself (Twitter/blog/web publication/newspaper) doesn’t really matter. It’s the “who”.

This is why Google is placing so much emphasis on authors in search results (well, one reason at lesast).

According to the Guardian interview, Curley thinks the issue of sites “using stories without permission” is “worse now than it’s ever been” because said sites are getting a “free-ride on other people’s content”. If he’s talking about aggregators that provide a snippet and a link to the original or another news site referencing something reported in a separate article on the subject, then he’s just not acknowledging how the world wide web works – pages that link to other pages where appropriate. Links and quotes provide context to stories.

Maybe he’s talking about scraper sites or sites that are straight up stealing content and passing it off as their own without credit. Sure, that stuff is not good, but I don’t get the impression this is the “issue” he’s talking about. That certainly wasn’t the “issue” when there was an “issue” with Google in the past, which according to the interview, led to Google paying 8 figures for AP content licensing.

Curley is quoted as saying, “We are not trying to shut down the web.” But what is the web without pages linking to other pages? It’s not much of a “web”.

The main argument appears to be that the AP needs to get paid by anyone who wants to point to their content. “It costs a lot of money to have a journalist in Afghanistan and make sure they can stay alive and get their video, their stills and their text back to us,” he is quoted as saying.

How much money do you think it costs to keep Google’s servers up and running? Or Twitter’s? Or Facebook’s? Is the AP using these service in their reporting efforts? It costs the average citizen who may be living paycheck to paycheck to pay their Internet or phone bill, which was required for them to tweet that breaking news the AP and other news agencies jumped on. Are they getting paid for their efforts?

The AP, along with nearly 30 other news organizations have banded together to create NewsRight, a new system that seeks payment from those using their work. The usual gray areas come into question. The issue of fair use, which seems to win in court time and time again, at least when you look at the recent Righthaven saga, will continue to be debated.

Thanks to the web, the free flow of information has never been greater. Traditional media entities need to recognize that it goes both ways.

Should the AP pay Twitter for every tweet it references? Should it pay the citizen who created the tweet? Tell us what you think in the comments.