‘The UK news service pioneering the use of artificial intelligence to help journalists scale up the production of local news stories has progressed from its beta trials to a subscription-funded service.’
RADAR is for Reporters and Data and Robots, a news service that creates location-specific stories from public data files, such as reports from
Journalists select the stories and the way each will be told. Algorithms find the facts pertinent to each locality and arrange them in the narrative.
Using this hybrid workflow, a staff of six journalists is providing localized news to 391 districts in Britain according to the UK news agency, Press Association, which reported the move from beta testing to commercialization. PA says the service has filed more than 100,000 localized articles since piloting began in December 2017.
Press Association is a joint venture partner in RADAR with Urbs Media, a British data journalism company.
OUR TAKE
- RADAR shows how AI tools can be at the centre of new standalone news operations.
- Look for more projects with this business model — a small new company teaming with a large legacy business, scaling quickly with a small staff that leverages a purpose-built AI system.