Exclusive vs. mass release

I'd like thoughts on the pro's and con's of giving a reporter an exclusive
to a story as opposed to simply releasing it to reporters that it should be
of interest to. For example, contacting an AP reporter and offering it to
them as an exclusive. And by "exclusive", I mean I don't contact any other
reporter and let the one reporter break the story first. After it's broken,
the exclusive dies.

Now there are, of course, dangers in doing this. If they oppose your
position (or whatever), the first story on it would then be a negative one.
As for fearing that they won't report on it at all, that's not really a
problem. They don't and you simply submit it to your second choice and
offer the same deal.

A benefit would be getting it actually covered by that reporter. AP is
carried by all daily newspapers and reaches over a billion people everyday.
However, AP is just a news service and cannot guarantee it will get in all
those newspapers. That decision is left up to the local editor.

Thoughts? Also, suggestions on how to best do this would be appreciated.

Scott Jensen
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