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News Agencies
The first news agencies emerged in the wake of the industrial revolution in the 19th century. Thanks to telegraphy, a fast and efficient transmission medium had become available, making it possible to meet the increasing demand for information from all over the world. In many countries agencies sprang up which specialized in the trade in news: “Mr. Reuter’s Cabled Messages” in London in 1851, “Wolff’sche Telegraphische Bureau” in Berlin in 1849, “Associated Press” in North America in 1848 and “Österreichische Correspondenz” in Vienna in 1849.
While new agencies were founded in other countries primarily for commercial considerations, in Austria political reasons were decisive for establishing news agencies. In the year following the 1848 revolution in Austria, the news agency became the central mouthpiece in the government.
In 1922 the Austrian agency was renamed “Amtliche Nachrichtenstelle” (ANA); in 1938 it was replaced by the National Socialist „Deutsche Nachrichten Büro“(DNB).
The longstanding tradition of government-owned agencies came to an end only in 1946. “Austria Presse Agentur” (APA) was founded as an independent private cooperative association of the Austrian dailies, with the aim of ensuring an “(…) independent news service for the Austrian newspapers, irrespective of their political or ideological tendency”.
APA - Austria’s market leader - is presently a profit-oriented enterprise managed on the basis of economic principles. The outsourcing of individual services, which started in 2000, has so far resulted in three wholly-owned subsidiaries having the following operating areas:
• APA OTS Originaltext-Service GmbH (distribution of original texts)
• APA-DeFacto Datenbank & Contentmanagement GmbH (databases and profile services)
• APA-IT Informationstechnologie GmbH (technology)
Next to APA and other international news agencies (e.g. ”Reuters”, “Associated Press”, “Deutsche Presse Agentur”, “Agence France Press”, etc.), a number of organizations offer special news services for the media.
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