Most people online by now have encountered some AI writing, and it is spreading faster than digital kudzu, polluting the search results and news coverage at a disturbing rate. The content that is AI-generated is bland, repetitive, and generally light in actual content, over 700 words of pablum to deliver anything pertinent that can be contained in a pair of sentences. And publishers are leaning towards this rice cake-level of content.
READ MORE: AI Is Making the Least Trusted Sites for Information the Most Relevant for Information
As the industry constricts, and public faith in the news outlets is dropping to a level that can be measured in fathoms, it is leading to financial strain on those outlets. In response, they are not looking to improve their product to make things more attractive; they are leaning in the other direction, seeking out more fiscally efficient means. AI is proving too big a temptation.
Now we see that one of the primary news sources in the country is basically demanding that it be transformed into this homogenized style of creation. Max Tani, reporting at Semafor, details that at the Associated Press, they are openly declaring that relying on artificial intelligence as a form of writing will become a primary tool of their news dissemination process.
This all sprang forth from a recent episode at the Cleveland Plain Dealer. A job applicant went public with their refusal to accept a position at the paper after learning they would not be expected to file news reports. Instead, for the position of “AI Rewrite Specialist,” they would feed notes or outlines into an AI program, which would then spit out an article for publication. The managing editor at the CPD raved about this development: “Artificial intelligence is not bad for newsrooms,” he wrote. “It’s the future of them.”
And this pre-fab production is being encouraged at the AP. Tani received some internal Slack channel messages from the outlet declaring that this would be the pathway for the company. Quoting Aimee Rinehart, the AP Senior Product Manager for AI, she informed the workers (in a very Skynet manner), “Resistance is futile.” In pushing for this robotic faux quality, the corporate dismissiveness was a very real characteristic.
She also noted that some editors told her that they would “prefer to have reporters report and have articles at least pre-written by AI. “There are many — and I mean MANY — editors who would prefer an AI-written article to a human-written one. Reporting and writing are two different skill sets and rare — RARE — is the occasion when it’s wrapped into one person.”
I will say this: The AP may have selected the correct person for that job, as Rinehart sounds as robotic and cold as a data center drone. Thinking forward, this is a disturbing development in that AP supplies file reports for a wide range of outlets, making this move towards AI slop something that will infect newsrooms already afflicted with a bacterial form of journalism.
It was years ago when we covered that the Miami Herald was using an AI program for banal home sales listings in the area. In a manner, this made some sense, as these are generally not “written” pieces, but just lay out basic stats on a property, but even then, you come across the crutch being flawed. The listing in the Miami paper for a local property included the unhelpful detail that this was a “Florida house."
The attitude behind this declaration from AP carries the air of resignation. Instead of striving to improve the product and deliver quality that will draw more readers, this feels like they have thrown up their hands in surrender to the reality of reader flight and are looking to operate in the cheapest way possible.
In one way, this can be looked at as the further demise of journalism. But in another, this is the kind of thing that could elevate work by writers.
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