Washington - The news gathering organization Agence France-Presse (AFP) announced that it has settled a lawsuit with Google, and licensed the company to use AFP news and photos on Google News and other services.

AFP sued Google for copyright infringement in March 2005, for posting AFP headlines, news summaries and photos on Google services without permission.

The lawsuit sought an injunction and unspecified damages.

"The agreement will allow uses of AFP's content in ways that go beyond its typical use of content in Google's services, which features just headlines and snippets of text to provide just a taste of what an article offers," said AFP chairman and CEO Pierre Louette, declining to elaborate on the deal.

AFP, which counts 4,000 journalists covering 165 countries, already has licensing deals with Yahoo, MSN, AOL and others.

Related Links:
http://www.afp.com/english/afp/?pid=news&release=afp_google

http://tinyurl.com/2fcatg (CNET)