Will AI save local journalism or hinder it? An event in Mountain View, California, and comments from experts provide an overview of the current state of local news and the challenges it faces.
A discussion examining how advances in AI could affect local news took place at a Next Endeavor event in Mountain View, California. Ken Doctor of Lookout Santa Cruz and others joined the panel, which presented examples of using AI to automate the collection and distribution of local information and noted that it is also used for translation and geocoding.
The speakers’ comments showed how AI is entering the processes of reporting, news production, writing and distribution. Practical examples included automating newsletters and automatically collecting and distributing information by locality, with an explanation that the time required for conventional tasks could be significantly reduced. Human oversight was considered essential, while quality control was recognized as an ongoing challenge.
Gabriel Sama of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism pointed to changes since 2013, the decline in the number of reporters and the disruption caused by the spread of large language models. He also touched on challenges including readers’ limited understanding of the rapid development of machine learning and the increase in apocalyptic headlines, emphasizing the importance of the principle of originality.
Quina Kim, who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, discussed young people’s skepticism toward AI and the tension between that skepticism and its practical use in education. While viewing the use of Descript positively, she pointed to concerns that training by AI agents could take away conventional training opportunities. Examples of using NotebookLM were also cited, prompting discussion of how responsibilities should be divided between people and AI.
Meanwhile, it was also suggested that efforts to use AI for holding power to account and for investigative journalism would continue. Specific examples included loading municipal budget data from Eugene, Oregon, into AI for comparative analysis and bringing anomalies to the surface, illustrating AI’s practical value.