Artificial Intelligence and Journalism: a global survey of newsrooms
The Journalism AI report is based on a survey of 71 news organisations in 32 different countries regarding artificial intelligence and associated technologies conducted by Polis, the journalism think-tank at the LSE. A wide range of journalists working with AI answered questions about their understanding of AI, how it was used in their newsrooms, and their views on the wider potential and risks for the news industry.
What emerges from this research is that artificial intelligence (AI) is a significant part of journalism already but it is unevenly distributed. AI is giving journalists more power, but with that comes editorial and ethical responsibilities.
The future impact of AI is uncertain but it has the potential for wide-ranging and profound influence on how journalism is made and consumed. AI can free up journalists to work on creating better journalism at a time when the news industry is fighting for economic sustainability and for public trust and relevance. It can also help the public cope with a world of news overload and misinformation and to connect them in a convenient way to credible content that is relevant, useful and stimulating for their lives.
This report is not a manual for implementation, but rather an introduction to and discussion of journalism and AI. We hope it will help newsrooms make decisions around strategy, and think proactively about the ethical and editorial challenges, as well as the potential implications of adopting these new technologies.
About #JournalismAI
Journalism AI is a project of Polis — the journalism think-tank at the London School of Economics and Political Science — in collaboration with the Google News Initiative. Through research and training, the project aims to educate and inform newsrooms about the potential offered by AI-powered technologies, while nurturing an international network of news innovators.
You can read the full report with sections on defining AI; how newsrooms are using AI; AI strategy; ethics and editorial policy; and AI and the future of news by clicking here.
You can watch a video of my presentation of the report at its launch event here.
There is an extensive bibliography of articles, books and reports on AI and journalism collated here — this will be updated periodically.
The author welcomes feedback on this report at C.H.Beckett@lse.ac.uk
If you want to be involved in future Journalism AI initiatives, do not hesitate to get in touch with Mattia Peretti at M.Peretti@lse.ac.uk
