Thoughts?
1. On the most serious angle, is this not just another allegedly big-hearted organization or individual chasing after the same bigger-pocketed organizations and individuals for seed money to distribute? Dick Tofel has covered this plethora (how many in a plethora, jefe de la prensa?) of such organizations.
2. Related? How much of this money is going to get laundered through the AP? This push isn't seed money to help community papers hire more reporters. Rather:
The new funds will be used to support AP's local journalism efforts, as well as the work of other organizations or services that support local newsrooms, per Veerasingham.
So, "laundered" might be harsh. "Recycled" is not.
And, obviously, this isn't going to go to non-weeklies, at least not to ones that were already non-weekly pre-COVID. So, the AP won't be helping the Marion County Record, raising a new round of hell (Word doc at link) over water quality public notices or lack thereof, not quite a year after being subjected to the folding, spindling and mutilation of the First Amendment.
3. Less serious but not totally unserious? Since AP recently reversed course from several months ago, and said, at least indirectly, that it WILL miss Gannett and McClatchy, and since more than 80 percent of its revenue stream is still from story (and video) licensing, when one stops limiting the scope to US newspapers, is this going to compete with the tip jar on its website?
4. Since it is e-commerce partnering with Taboola (that after clickbait webpage partnering with it years ago), is there going to be any quid pro quo on this help?
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