“AI and automation have a place,” McCrudden said, when asked about AI’s role in the news-making process.
The objective, McCrudden explained, is to use AI and automation as a way of liberating news teams from tedious work and instead focus on producing higher-value journalism.
“AI is really about empowering our people, not replacing them,” he stressed, saying it’s “a way of getting rid of the mundane stuff, so you can focus on the stories that matter.”
McCrudden outlined the ways in which AI and automation are applied to AP’s news operations, including using AI not just as a newsgathering tool but also to increase audience engagement.
AP has used AI to manage information flows, produce audio-to-text transcriptions, help with text-to-text translations, create shot lists in predictable environments, write stories based on data sets, localize content and more.
AP started automatically generating corporate earnings stories in 2014 and has added automated game previews and recaps of some sports.
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