The American News Service was formed to sell Hearst's wire reports to outside morning papers in the United States.

[6][4] Shortly after its establishment, the American News Service was split into two divisions to cater to morning and evening newspapers across the United States.

Scripps combined three smaller syndicates under his control into United Press Associations,[10] INS battled the other major newswires.

New York City's all-news radio station, WINS, then under Hearst ownership, took its call letters from INS,[12] as did the short-lived (1948–49), DuMont Television Network nightly newscast, I.N.S.

[13] Marion Carpenter, the first woman national press photographer to cover Washington, D.C., and the White House, and to travel with a US president, also had worked for the INS.

[14] The INS also counted among its ranks other famous journalists, including Jack Lait, Damon Runyon, Karl Henry von Wiegand, Otto D. Tolischus, Dorothy Thompson, Hubert Renfro Knickerbocker, Pierre J. Huss, Richard Tregaskis, Max Jordan.

[2] During the early years of World War I, Hearst's INS was barred from using Allied telegraph lines, because of reporting of British losses.

[15] INS made do by allegedly taking news stories off AP bulletin boards, rewriting them and selling them to other outlets.