Anews agency is an organization that gathersnews reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such asnewspapers,magazines andradio andtelevisionbroadcasters. News agencies are known for theirpress releases. A news agency may also be referred to as awire service,newswire, ornews service.
Although there are many news agencies around the world, three global news agencies,Agence France-Presse (AFP), theAssociated Press (AP), andReuters have offices in most countries of the world, cover all areas of media, and provide the majority of international news printed by the world's newspapers.[1] All three began with and continue to operate on a basic philosophy of providing a single objective news feed to all subscribers.Jonathan Fenby explains the philosophy:
To achieve such wide acceptability, the agencies avoid overt partiality. Demonstrably correct information is their stock in trade. Traditionally, they report at a reduced level of responsibility, attributing their information to a spokesman, the press, or other sources. They avoid making judgments and steer clear of doubt and ambiguity. Though their founders did not use the word, objectivity is the philosophical basis for their enterprises – or failing that, widely acceptable neutrality.[2]
Newspaper syndicates generally sell their material to one client in each territory only, while news agencies distribute news articles to all interested parties.
Only a few large newspapers could afford bureaus outside their home city; they relied instead on news agencies, especiallyHavas (founded 1835) in France—now known asAgence France-Presse (AFP)—and theAssociated Press (founded 1846) in the United States. Former Havas employees foundedReuters in 1851 in Britain andWolff in 1849 in Germany.[3] In 1865, Reuter and Wolff signed agreements with Havas's sons, forming a cartel designating exclusive reporting zones for each of their agencies within Europe.[4] For international news, the agencies pooled their resources, so that Havas, for example, covered the French Empire, South America and the Balkans and shared the news with the other national agencies. In France the typical contract with Havas provided a provincial newspaper with 1800 lines of telegraphed text daily, for an annual subscription rate of 10,000 francs. Other agencies provided features and fiction for their subscribers.[5]
The development of the telegraph in the 1850s led to the creation of strong national agencies in England, Germany, Austria and the United States. But despite the efforts of governments, through telegraph laws such as in 1878 in France, inspired by the BritishTelegraph Act of 1869 which paved the way for the nationalisation of telegraph companies and their operations, the cost of telegraphy remained high.
In the United States, the judgment inInter Ocean Publishing v. Associated Press facilitated competition by requiring agencies to accept all newspapers wishing to join. As a result of the increasing newspapers, the Associated Press was now challenged by the creation ofUnited Press Associations in 1907 andInternational News Service by newspaper publisherWilliam Randolph Hearst in 1909.
Driven by the huge U.S. domestic market, boosted by the runaway success of radio, all three major agencies required the dismantling of the "cartel agencies" through the Agreement of 26 August 1927. They were concerned about the success of U.S. agencies from other European countries which sought to create national agencies after the First World War. Reuters had been weakened by war censorship, which promoted the creation of newspaper cooperatives in the Commonwealth and national agencies in Asia, two of its strong areas.
After the Second World War, the movement for the creation of national agencies accelerated, when accessing the independence of former colonies, the national agencies were operated by the state. Reuters, became cooperative, managed a breakthrough in finance, and helped to reduce the number of U.S. agencies from three to one, along with the internationalization of the SpanishEFE and the globalization of Agence France-Presse.
In 1924,Benito Mussolini placed Agenzia Stefani under the direction ofManlio Morgagni, who expanded the agency's reach significantly both within Italy and abroad. Agenzia Stefani was dissolved in 1945, and its technical structure and organization were transferred to the newAgenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata (ANSA). Wolffs was taken over by the Nazi regime in 1934.[7] TheGerman Press Agency (dpa) in Germany was founded as a co-operative inGoslar on 18 August 1949 and became alimited liability company in 1951. Fritz Sänger was the firsteditor-in-chief. He served asmanaging director until 1955 and asmanaging editor until 1959. The first transmission occurred at 6 a.m. on 1 September 1949.[8]
Since the 1960s, the major agencies were provided with new opportunities in television and magazine, and news agencies delivered specialized production of images and photos, the demand for which is constantly increasing. In France, for example, they account for over two-thirds of national market.[9]
By the 1980s, the four main news agencies, AFP, AP, UPI and Reuters, provided over 90% of foreign news printed by newspapers around the world.[10]
Governments may also control news agencies: China (Xinhua), Russia (TASS), and several other countries have government-funded news agencies which also use information from other agencies as well.[11]
The major news agencies generally prepare hard news stories and feature articles that can be used by other news organizations with little or no modification, and then sell them to other news organizations. They provide these articles in bulk electronically through wire services (originally they usedtelegraphy; today they frequently use theInternet). Corporations, individuals, analysts, andintelligence agencies may also subscribe.
News sources, collectively, described asalternative media provide reporting which emphasizes a self-defined "non-corporate view" as a contrast to the points of view expressed in corporate media and government-generated news releases.Internet-basedalternative news agencies form one component of these sources.
There are several different associations of news agencies.EANA is the European Alliance of Press Agencies, while theOANA is an association of news agencies of the Asia-Pacific region.MINDS is a global network of leading news agencies collaborating in new media business.
^Jonathan Fenby,The International News Services (1986), p. 25.
^Jonathan Fenby,The International News Services (1986).
^"Ch 7 Telegraph"Archived 2013-08-01 at theWayback Machine,Revolutions in Communication: Media history from Gutenberg to the digital age (2010). Retrieved February 12, 2013.
Fenby, Jonathan.The International News Services (1986)[ISBN missing]
Gramling, Oliver.AP: The Story of News (1940)[ISBN missing]
Kenny, Peter. "News agencies as content providers and purveyors of news: A mediahistoriographical study on the development and diversity of wire services" (MPhil Diss. University of Stellenbosch, 2009)online, with a detailed bibliography pp. 171–200
Morris, Joel Alex.The Deadline Every Minute: The Story of the United Press (1957)[ISBN missing]
Paterson, Chris A., and Annabelle Sreberny, eds.International news in the 21st Century (University of Luton Press, 2004)[ISBN missing]
Putnis, P. "Reuters in Australia: the supply and exchange of news, 1859–1877"Media History (2004). 10#2 pp: 67–88.
Read, D.The power of news: the history of Reuters (Oxford UP, 1992).[ISBN missing]
Schwarzlose, Richard Allen.The American wire services: a study of their development as a social institution (1979)[ISBN missing]
Stephens, M.A history of news (3rd ed. Oxford UP, 2007).[ISBN missing]
Sterling, C. H. "News agencies" inEncyclopedia of international media and communications (2003) 3: 235–246.
Storey, Graham.Reuter's Century (1951)[ISBN missing]
Xin, X. "A developing market in news: Xinhua News Agency and Chinese newspapers"Media, Culture & Society (2006) 28#1 pp: 45–66.
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