The Dawn of the Cyborg Journalist
As A.I. increasingly infiltrates journalism, the reporting and consumption of news will change forever
Could A.I. personalization go too far, reinforcing our existing interests and opinions rather than the traditional journalistic role of introducing the reader to important new information selected by experienced editors?
If you happened to be watching the Chinese state broadcaster Xinhua in March, you might have noticed something strange.
During the country’s largest political event of the year, TV anchor Xin Xiaomeng presented a piece on delegates arriving by train. But there was something unreal about her — literally. Xin Xiaomeng is a digital composite, one created with the help of machine learning to mimic the facial expressions and speech-patterns of a real-life news anchor.
Xin Xiaomeng is part of the growing ranks of artificial newsreaders on Xinhua, all of them flawlessly delivering whatever is fed to them, without tiring, without slipping up, and without protesting. For a…
