Australian Associated Press

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Launched in 1935, Australian Associated Press is Australia's news agency monopoly. Its stories are heavily used by the Australian news media.

AAP employs more than 175 journalists who work in bureaux in all Australian states and territories. It also maintains correspondents in Port Moresby, London, Auckland and Jakarta as well as using a network of contributors from the US, Europe and Asia. AAP's domestic news coverage is complemented by alliances with the major international news agencies.

AAP's main focus is on breaking hard news. But it also distributes soft news, colour stories, feature stories, opinion, filler material and photographs.

Tony Gillies is the editor-in-chief, Stuart Parker is the head of news and finance and Mike Osborne is the head of sport and racing.

1 Ownership
2 Dominance
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Ownership

AAP is owned by four Australian news organisations - News Ltd, Fairfax, West Australian Newspapers (publishers of The West Australian) and Rural Press Limited. Fairfax and News Ltd both own 45 per cent, West Australian Newspapers 8 per cent, and Rural Press 2 per cent. Together these companies produce the vast majority of Australian newspapers.

[edit] Dominance

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AAP is Australia's only news agency and is therefore used very heavily. The majority of the country's newspapers, radio stations and news websites subscribe to the service and run AAP copy.

Often, the material is used without proper attribution, with many Australian newspaper reporters taking AAP stories and simply putting their bylines on them.

AAP's dominance means that any mistakes they make are readily distributed throughout most of the country's commercial media. However, AAP has shown it is willing to speedily correct errors on the record.