The AP’s tiny battle with Rogers Cadenhead over copyright issues appears to have ended with a whimper and no bang as the AP met with Cadenhead and has issued a vague statement about upcoming standards.

Rogers noted today:

I think AP and other media organizations should focus on how to encourage bloggers to link their stories in the manner they like, rather than hoping their lawyers can rebottle the genie of social news.

He’s right regardless of how the courts will be interpreting upcoming cases of copyright infringement.   Unlike the music industry where a case can be made that bootlegging leads to lost revenue, blogging AP stories arguably *improves* APs distribution and presence in journalism.   AP is shooting itself in the foot, if not the head, when it fights bloggers with copyright lawsuits and takedowns.

Obviously blogging has a long way to go before it will have the mainstream respect typically reserved for mainstream journalism.    Part of gaining that respect will be bloggers taking on more responsibility and accountability with respect to attribution and quoting.  Meanwhile the legacy news industry must come to grips with the fact that blogging isn’t just news and analysis, it is a dynamic and powerful global conversation that will throw off any chains as fast as they can be applied.