Picture this. You are sitting at your desk at work and you’ve just been cancelled…by a chatbot. Worries about human displacement have grown with the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI). The joke’s on you, as research by investment firm Goldman Sachs indicates that artificial intelligence (AI) could replace the equivalent of 300 million full-time jobs. In other words, it has the potential to replace a quarter of all labor duties in the United States and Europe, while also creating new employment and increasing productivity and profitability by seven percent, according to BBC.
A recent AI tech offshoot invented by Google is in the development process. It will write news stories, providing additional evidence that the technology has the potential to revolutionize white-collar jobs, reports the New York Times.
Dubbed “Genesis,” it will employ AI technology to gather information on current events and then generate news stories. The tool was offered as a “helpmate” to News Corp, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal.
Google announced that it was in the early phases of testing this AI tool, which it elaborated to assist journalists with headline ideas or alternative writing styles. It was made clear that the technology was not intended to “replace” journalists, however.
According to those familiar with the product, Google saw it as a kind of personal assistant for journalists, an augmentative device intended to automate repetitious tasks, thus freeing up time for genuine creativity, and enabling the publishing industry to steer clear of the dangers of generative AI.
“These tools are not intended to replace the role journalists have in reporting, creating, and fact-checking their articles. 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,” said Google.
The New York Times and Google have both expressed interest in utilizing AI to produce accurate and insightful news stories. Google sees the tool as a “personal assistant for journalists” to automate tasks and an opportunity to shield them from the pitfalls of generative AI. OpenAI and the Associated Press have partnered to train its AI models, which ingest vast amounts of material to produce plausible responses.
Accounting Group KPMG carried out a study in June, which concluded that 43% of the tasks performed by authors, writers, and translators could be carried out by AI tools.
Incidentally, Apple is testing an AI-powered chatbot called Apple GPT, which is expected to give traditional AI technology a run for its money.
OpenAI executive Peter Welinder has denied claims that the model underpinning the most advanced version of ChatGPT, GPT-4, is getting “dumber.” Users can check how responses have changed by inputting a previously used prompt from more antiquated versions of ChatGPT and by comparing the outputs which follow.
While newsrooms explore the possibility of using AI, an investigation by anti-misinformation outfit NewsGuard found that bots were already powering dozens of AI-generated content farms.
Google’s new tool offers advantages as well as drawbacks. “If this technology can reliably deliver factual information, journalists should use it,” said Jarvis, who is also a director of the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at City University of New York.
News organizations all over the world are contemplating the use of artificial intelligence in their newsrooms, with firms such as The Times, NPR, and Insider all showing interest in using AI responsibly in high-stakes news features, according to the New York Times.