• The Wall Street Journal, Friday, June 27, 2008 9:45 AM

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 service. The following month Murdoch was appointed to the AP's board of directors.

Read the whole story at The Wall Street Journal »