Vantaggi
One of the best aspects of the AP is knowing that getting the news out accurately, quickly, and fairly is an important mission. This probably depends on how you feel about the press in general, but the AP in particular has to serve many audiences, conservative and liberal, domestic and international, large cities and rural areas. It is also not an enormous company in terms of total employee count, although it has a wide footprint around the globe.
Svantaggi
The biggest challenge facing the AP is its shrinking customer base. Daily newspapers in the US are vanishing and cutting costs, and although the need for a wire service increases as papers cut their own staff, some simply cannot afford to be members of the cooperative. That has lead to challenges at the AP, as they have had to change their focus to some degree away from the traditional newspaper base, and concentrate on fast-breaking online news outlets. And many of those also compete with the AP. So the entire company has to continue to cut costs, trim personnel, and consolidate bureaus.