Associated Press Television News

Associated Press Television News, known as either AP Television News or APTN, is a global video news agency.

AP Television News is the video division of the Associated Press. It provides many of the world broadcasters with a round-the-clock continuous feed of news, sports, entertainment and feature video content. Associated Press Television News Ltd. is a UK corporation owned and controlled by the Associated Press.

Headquartered in North London, AP Television News was founded in 1994 as Associated Press Television or APTV. In 1998 it merged with Worldwide Television News (WTN), a subsidiary of the British news broadcaster Independent Television News (ITN) and formerly known as "UPITN" as it was a joint venture between ITN and United Press International, to form APTN.

Since its rebranding in 2005, the APTN name and logo has been dropped in favour of "AP Television News", featuring the red AP logo of the Associated Press to emphasise its connection to the AP. However, many broadcsters still refer to the organization as APTN.

APTN distributes video to its client broadcasters around the world, mostly by satellite. Many major broadcasters and networks rely heavily upon APTN for major breaking news from around the world. The company also provides specilalised "Broadcast Services" for its clients, such as editing, crewing or satellite feeds from news and sports events. Historical footage is also made available from its extensive film and video archives, which date back to 1895.

APTN is based in North London (in a former gin warehouse on the Grand Union Canal called "The Interchange") with bureaus in 85 cities and 79 nations, including New York City, Washington D.C., Paris and Moscow; as well as current-event regions such as Iraq and Afghanistan. It uses fibre-optic and satellite-based distribution networks to relay video footage to TV networks and newsrooms. (Broadcasters based in London receive the APTN video feed by local terrestrial circuits, know as "local ends," via the BT Tower.

Video news agencies such as APTN (and Reuters TV) typically do not produce programmes that TV owners could watch. Rather, they provide footage of an event with only natural sound and very loose editing. However, APTN does also produce a range of entertainment and special interest programmes that are provided "white label" for client use. Agency customers, who are local and national TV stations, documentary producers, cable television news channels, and the like, edit the agency footage to suit their style, and add their own graphics and voice-overs before transmission.

The premise for a video news agency is simple: very few TV stations devote enough money to newsgathering to put hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of camera, editing, and satellite transmission equipment everywhere that news might happen. Video news agencies provide rapid response coverage and international reach for those TV stations.

The agencies obtain footage through a mixture of their own camera crews, arrangements with local TV broadcasters to redistribute their material, material shot by freelancers who sell their footage to the agencies, and on rare occasions footage shot by the public (such as the famous footage of the Air France Concorde jetliner that crashed outside Paris in 2000.) Footage shot with broadcast-quality cameras is obviously preferred, but quality can sometimes come second to content or immediacy for an exclusive story.

The maintenance of a network of local bureaux by the agencies means that local staff with expert knowledge are on hand to capture footage in places where Western camera crews could be in danger. An example of this is the Kosovo War in Serbia during which most journalists left the country prior to the NATO bombing campaign. In addition, TV reporters who often do not have the budgets or expertise to carry with a full satellite uplink are able to use the local agency bureaux. AP Television News has a department called "Broadcast Services" which specialises in providing on site production and transmission facilities either through the AP bureaux infrastructure or at breaking or set-piece news events. APTN managed to get a satellite dish and transmission gear into Banda Aceh, Indonesia, following the 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake before the region was closed to air traffic. This became just about the only live video feed point available for the world's media, and was used extensively by network reporters for tranmsmitting their recorded reports, or going "live" on air into their news bulletins.

Wherever you see the same footage on more than one news station, the chances are that it came either from or via a video news agency.

APTN's contributions to world news coverage include live coverage of the Beslan school hostage crisis for which it won the 2005 International Emmy for TV News Coverage, and coverage of French nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific, foiled suicide bombings in Israel, the return of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China, and of the death of Pope John Paul II.

APTN also uses its global network of news reporters, videographers and producers and its relationship with more than 400 of the world's leading broadcasters to help businesses in their public relations campaigns. Handled by its Corporate Services division, APTN produces and distributes video news releases directly into every major television newsroom in the world. A video news release (VNR) is a video-form press release designed for use on broadcast television, either as a news item or a feature story. APTN produced VNRs can let the world know about a business' new product or its launch of an international campaign. Because of its relationship with newsrooms around the world, the effectiveness of an APTN produced and distributed VNR can be easily tracked. Once APTN distributes a VNR, Corporate Services' personnel contact news editors to develop a report detailing when, where and how the material was used. APTN offers this service despite concern among journalists about some news broadcasters relying solely on VNR material for their news budgets instead of reporting the actual news on their own.

External links

* [http://www.aptn.com APTN Website]
* [http://www.aparchive.com APTN Archive Website]