The Associated Press, a 162-year-old newsgathering cooperative for the newspaper industry, is beginning to fracture. It is producing more content for other news outlets, including the Web portals like Google, that are battering newspapers. For some editors, the AP's strategy and its high prices, amount to a betrayal, and a few papers have set up alternative news services. But newspaper owners tend to support the AP's initiatives. In an interesting twist, Rupert Murdoch, owner of Dow Jones & Co., decided in March not to renew a partnership with the AP, replacing it with a French news …

To get young people involved in the election and in their programming, NBC News, MSNBC.com and MySpace are running a contest among MySpace users for the job of covering the Democratic National Convention in Denver and the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis. The contest is open to people over 18 who submit a short video answering simple questions. Five finalists will be voted on by the MySpace community in a sort of "Political Idol." In an election "that has so engaged people, it's right that we try to find ways to get original voices in the conversation around …

Compared to ads on only one platform, advertising on multiple platforms results in a higher percentage of consumers who purchase the product or service being advertised, according to new research by Integrated Media Measurement. Running ads more frequently also helps sales. Amanda Welsh, research chief at IMMI, says, "This shows ads on multiple platforms get consumers to engage in the target behavior," of buying things, which is "more important than reach." Consumers exposed to television ads for five movies had an average conversion rate of 5.52%, while consumers exposed to ads on TV and at least one …

Disney has taken a leadership position in scoping out new venues where people can watch TV shows and advertising can be part of the experience. The company has been testing if viewers will watch ABC shows on-demand through cable providers that disable the ability to zip through ads. It is now watching the results of adding more commercials to its Web-video viewer. "We want to test all forms of advertising as we see our content migrate to additional platforms. We want to be in those new places and we want there to be advertising," says Mike Shaw, ABC's …

In a burst of innovation, Time Inc. plans to unveil Maghound.com this September. It is a Netflix-like service in which readers can order individual issues of print magazines for a flat monthly fee. Maghound.com allows consumers to choose titles from a variety of publishers via mix-and-match "subscriptions," where they pay one monthly fee and have the ability to switch titles at any time. Members can also cancel whenever they wish. The plan is to have 300 titles participating by the launch. "There has been a paradigm shift in the way consumers shop, pay for and manage the …

In a bid to incorporate the audience into its programming under the guise of charity, an episode of ESPN Radio show "Mike & Mike in the Morning" is being auctioned off to listeners. Money from the auction will go to the V Foundation for Cancer Research. People bid online in early July and the winning bidder will have the show, hosted by Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic, broadcast live from their home or property. In all, 18 ESPN "fan experiences" will be auctioned off, ranging from tickets to sporting events to visits to ESPN headquarters.

In the old analog days, people who couldn't get on traditional radio turned to broadcasting illegally over unlicensed radio frequencies. But now pirate broadcasters can put their radio programs on the Web with a computer and a telephone. BlogTalkRadio, which helps alternative broadcasters, just closed an initial $4.6 million round of funding led by The Kraft Group, the owners of the New England Patriots. The service lets anyone host a live radio talk show over the telephone or Internet, complete with live guests and callers. Show creators get half the ad revenue. Recent participants include Brad Pitt …

Content recognition software is getting so sophisticated that traditional media companies can now track where and how their content is being used online. The dust-up between the AP and bloggers was just an early skirmish in what's likely to become a protracted war over media content that's published online. Bloggers and Web sites are eager to ensure continued access to information, but media companies are intent on controlling or cashing in on the dissemination of their stories, videos and other content. New systems automate the tracking job and do it less expensively than past systems. The new …

The Writers Guild of America West wants the FCC to make rules that mandate disclosure of product integration in TV shows. In a letter, guild president Patric Verrone urges the agency "to require on-screen, real-time disclosure on TV programming where product integration occurs, in order to make viewers aware of the range of products they are overtly--and more often covertly--being sold." FCC officials heard testimony about product integration last year and are expected to release proposed rules this year. Verrone wrote that embedding products "exploits the emotional connection viewers have with shows to sell a product and …