“Interview responses from local practitioners showed that, while most perceive the relevance of automated journalism to local news reporting as less important than human reporter contributions, they paradoxically report a shift in their practices towards greater use of automated journalism. We conclude that currently, this reflects not outright denial but a sort of incremental digital creep in the processes of delivering journalism.“
– Kurt Barling
Before ChatGPT and its cohort of large language models, more structured data showed promise for automated journalism systems. One example is RADAR, an intelligent news assembly system provided by the UK Press Association.
A study co-authored by the writer considers attitudes toward automated journalism, both as they have been implemented in these automated writing machines and as they might advance in generative writing systems.
Kurt Barling is a Middlesex University journalism professor, writer, and broadcaster.