Source: telanganatoday.com

Hyderabad: The economic fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic has caused an unprecedented crisis in journalism that could decimate media organisations around the world.

The future of journalism and its survival could lie in artificial intelligence (AI). Francesco Marconi, a professor of Journalism at Columbia University in New York, published a book on the subject: Newsmakers, Artificial Intelligence and the future of Journalism.

His thesis is clear: the journalism world is not keeping pace with the evolution of new technologies. So, newsrooms need to take advantage of what AI can offer and come up with a new business model.

The robots are not taking over journalism jobs, but newsroom should adapt AI technologies and accept the way news is produced and consumed, according to a report by Polis, the media think-tank at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

AI is not there to replace journalists or eliminate jobs. Marconi believes that only eight to 12 per cent of reporters’ current tasks will be taken over by machines, which will in fact reorient editors and journalists towards value-added content: long-form journalism, feature interviews, analysis, data-driven journalism and investigative journalism.

One of the dangers of AI, is algorithm bias. Because algorithms are designed by humans, there will always be biases that can alter data analysis and lead to serious consequences. And human verification of content before publication will always remain a safeguard against errors.

We need to better equip our newsrooms and completely rethink the workflow to achieve better collaboration and better content that will attract new and paying subscribers.