Pharos University In Alexandria Faculty of Mass communication
International Communication
Week :7 Lecture :7
By: Dr: Zenat Abou Shawish 2013
Assessment
associated press
1 -The Associated Press
has been breaking news since it was created in 1846
Global media
2 -That year, five New York City
newspapers got together to fund a pony express route through
Alabama in order to bring news of the Mexican War north more
quickly than the U.S. Post Office could deliver it.
3 -In the decades since, AP has been first to tell the world of many of
history’s most important moments, from the assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the bombing of Pearl
Harbor to the fall of the shah of Iran and the death of Pope John Paul .
4-More than 30 AP journalists have given their lives in this pursuit of the news. “I go with Custer and
will be at the death,” AP reporter Mark Kellogg wrote before
Custer’s final stand against the Sioux. And so he was .
5 -One reason for AP’s longevity has been its ability to adapt quickly to
new technologies. When it was founded, words were the only
medium of communication .
Global agencies
6 -The first private sector
organization in the U.S. to operate on a national scale, AP delivered news by pigeon, pony express,
railroad, steamship, telegraph and teletype in the early years.
7-In 1935, AP began sending
photographs by wire. A radio network was formed in 1973, and an
international video division was added in 1994.
8 -In 2005, a digital database was created to hold all AP content,
which has allowed the agency to deliver news instantly and in every
format to the ever expanding online world.
9 -Today, AP news moves in digital
bits that travel nearly as quickly as the news itself unfolds, to every
platform available, from newspaper to tablets. AP’s video division is
now the world’s leading video news agency .
10 -Often called the “Marine Corps of journalism”—always first in
and last out—AP reports history in urgent installments, always
on deadline.
11 -AP staff in 300 locations in more than 100 countries
deliver breaking news that is seen or read by half the
world’s population on any given day.
12 -It remains a not-for-profit
cooperative, owned by 1,500 U.S. newspapers, which are both its
customers and its members. A Board of Directors comprised of publishers,
editors, and broadcast and radio executives oversee the cooperative .
13 -In 2003, AP moved from its long-time headquarters at Rockefeller
Center to its current global headquarters, on the West Side of
Manhattan, where it could integrate its all-format news
department in one space.
14 -In the process of that move, AP
established a Corporate Archives, which has since been
carefully documenting the story of AP from its beginnings.
15 -In old AP periodicals we discovered
the story of correspondent Frank Martin’s 13-day hike from Ledo, China in 1944 to link up with Gen.
16 -Vinegar Joe” Stillwell’s forces in Burma. The road was strewn with the skeletons of 30,000 refugees, Martin noted. At one
point he encountered a tribe of Naga headhunters singing “Old MacDonald Had a Farm, E-I-E-I-O.” The tribe had been taught the song by a missionary,
after which they cut off his head .
17 -On occasion, the findings have
been flattering. During the Civil Rights era, newspaper editors concerned that AP reporting of
racial tensions might upset their readers pressured AP to identify
blacks as “Negroes ”.
18 -Other historical findings reinforced AP’s remarkable role as eyewitness to history, such as when AP correspondent Joseph I.
Gilbert borrowed President Lincoln’s handwritten text of the Gettysburg Address
so he could copy it. Gilbert’s account of Lincoln’s speech stands as the most
accurate version of what Lincoln said that day.
19 -Even in this digital age, AP remains
the definitive source for reliable news across the globe. While the company has gone from distributing news via
pony express to instantaneous digital transmission, its news values and
mission remain the same .
20 -“The people of the AP are part of the
fabric of freedom,” said former board chairman Frank Batten. “They are the
honest messengers, mostly anonymous, far from the limelight, often at risk and
always committed to getting out the news as thoroughly and as accurately
as possible ”.