• by Erik Sass , August 30, 2010

The Associated Press has reached a new licensing agreement with Google, giving the search giant continuing access to AP news content in return for regular fees. This allows Google to host AP content in search results for the Web in general, as well as for Google News, which aggregates content from a wide variety of sources.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The licensing agreement extends an earlier deal signed in 2007, which expired in January of this year, leaving their relationship in limbo while the two sides negotiated.

The new agreement clears the way for the companies to collaborate on new products and services in the future, although details are sketchy, with Google senior business project manager Josh Cohen hinting vaguely that "Google and AP can work together to create a better user experience and new revenue opportunities."

For its part, AP said the companies will work together "to improve discovery and distribution of news."

In February of this year, the AP announced a similar licensing agreement with Google's competitor Yahoo, which also operates a popular news aggregation service.

From time to time, the Google-AP relationship seemed to be on the rocks. Last year, AP CEO Tom Curley suggested the consortium might limit visibility to search engines as part of a push to raise revenues by charging for some online content.

In this scenario (which never materialized), Curley mused that exclusive content offerings could be reserved for customers who paid the premium fees. Or, AP would make content available on a tiered schedule, with members who pay the premium fees gaining access for a period of time before the content then became widely available.

Google's reconciliation with the AP holds out hope that it may eventually also settle its differences with news organizations -- especially newspaper publishers. Like the AP, many newspaper execs have accused Google of profiting from their content without adequate compensation.