The Associated Press tackles problems in modern journalism via blockchain.

AP Makes the First Move Towards a Sustainable News Ecosystem

The cryptocurrency journalism and news media startup, Civil, has recently partnered with the Associated Press (AP) to take their platform to the next level. This collaboration plans to benefit both parties while ensuring that news stories are original, credible and uneasily shared or altered by foreign sources. AP has allowed Civil access to their news content and Civil will utilize the blockchain to monitor its distribution along with securing that it’s appropriately licensed. AP’s Senior Vice President for Strategy and Enterprise Development, Jim Kennedy, told the Scope Weekly that

AP has always tried to be a first mover in response to digital trends with potential impact on the news business. Blockchain technology could prove to be important in the future for registering and protecting content in syndication.

Can the Blockchain Stop Fake News?

Kennedy believes that manipulation of original news content has continually worsened in recent years especially with the rise of search, social and mobile sharing features. These disruptions prevent credit or compensation from ever reaching the authors. The “fake news” epidemic is something that Kennedy believes can improve through blockchain technologies such as those used by Civil.

Kennedy told the Scope Weekly, “Blockchain technology could help address both of these problems by making it possible to establish ownership, track usage and enforce publishing rights. Civil also hopes it will open up a new path to sustainable journalism, which is a goal worthy of our support.”

Due to the early stages of Blockchain development and integration, Kennedy is uncertain about how it will play a role in the future of journalism. However, he did say that the blockchain “holds promise for establishing ownership and rights to all kinds of creative content, which is a step forward on the wide-open internet.” Saying that AP is taking a ‘crawl, walk, run’ approach to this collaboration, Kennedy is excited to explore the opportunities. Kennedy told the Scope Weekly that AP is

interested in participating as one of Civil’s first service providers and exposing the value of AP to a set of news outlets that we might not otherwise be able to reach.

The two-year-old cryptocurrency startup has already raised $5 million for its blockchain technology which they plan to make available for the entire journalistic ecosystem. Last month, Civil partnered with a Singapore-based media company, Splice, to team up on 100 media projects in Asia over the next three years. Civil is set to announce even more alliances in the coming weeks as well.

Their initial coin offering (ICO) is scheduled to start September 18th and is open now for pre-registration. The blockchain is just now intersecting with the mainstream news media. With all of the mis/disinformation available today, it’s intriguing to see the news industry using disruptive options to uphold non-biased, accurate and professionally written content. It’s also enabling purchasing power of information through coin structures that although opposes AP’s traditional ways, Kennedy told the Scope Weekly that he is

nonetheless be interested to see how the token system evolves and what future opportunities it might enable.

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