In the growing debate over paid vs. free content, the AP is reportedly looking at its current licensing arrangements with news organizations. Specifically, they're looking at charging more for premium content delivered in a more timely manner.

The current rate charged to AP clients includes access to all of their material free from exclusivity.

The new approach would see the AP offering certain content for a limited window of time, say 20 or 30 minutes before it gets released to a wider audience. It's thought this will appeal to many of their existing clients.

AP chief executive Tom Curley says the move is also necessary given the increased competition in search between Google and Microsoft. The AP argues that for a long time now, search engines like Google have profited from linking to content that other organizations pay for.

The venerable new service claims that this linking costs them and their newspaper clients millions each year in lost revenues. As such, the AP projects their income to drop to around $700 million this year, down from $748 in 2008.

For its part however, Google maintains that any links it includes in its search results only benefit the parties concerned by driving traffic their way.

Regardless, the AP is also planning on introducing new efforts to search for unlicensed uses of its content online and recoup some of those financial losses.