With artificial intelligence (AI) coming into the picture, people are living in constant fear of losing their livelihoods. The debate between how many jobs AI is taking down and how many it is creating is a different area of contention, but for now, the tech giant, Google, is here with its new AI tool that is reportedly going to make the lives of journalists easier.
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Google is reportedly testing a new AI tool that is going to help one write news stories. The tech company has already started pitching the tool to publications like The New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal’s owner, News Corp.
This new AI tool is codenamed “Genesis.” It has the capacity to take in information and details and generate news copies. According to reports, Google thinks the tool can act as a personal assistant for journalists by automating some duties so that more time can be spent on others. The tool is viewed by the tech giant as an example of “responsible technology.”
According to the New York Times, some executives who were presented with the tool found it to be “unsettling,” saying that it appeared to disdain the effort that was put into producing factual news items.
However, in a statement given to Tech Crunch, a Google spokesperson expressed that the company is in partnership with news publishers, especially smaller ones, and they are exploring ideas to provide AI-enabled tools that could potentially be of some help to the journalists.
The spokesperson further said, “For instance, AI-enabled tools could assist journalists with options for headlines or different writing styles.” Moreover, they added, “Our goal is to give journalists the choice of using these emerging technologies in a way that enhances their work and productivity, just like we’re making assistive tools available for people in Gmail and in Google Docs. Quite simply, these tools are not intended to, and cannot, replace the essential role journalists have in reporting, creating, and fact-checking their articles.”
The report comes as a number of media outlets, such as NPR and Insider, have informed staff members that they plan to investigate how AI might be ethically employed in their newsrooms.
The Associated Press is one news organisation that has long employed AI to produce stories on topics like corporate earnings, although these news stories only make up a small portion of the organisation’s total number of pieces, which are all authored by journalists.
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Google’s new tool will probably cause alarm because stories produced by AI that haven’t been rigorously reviewed or fact-checked have the potential to propagate false information. This tool is also to become a beacon of trouble and uneasiness, as it might be a sign that the newsrooms could be taken over by AI.
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