AI takes center stage

We welcomed generative AI to the scene over the past year and took our first tentative baby steps onto the dance floor with it. Publishers and content creators tested, experimented, and learned cautiously. This year, we’ll see a more focused, coordinated choreography emerge as more creators and media organizations harness the power of gen AI tools, putting them to work.

AI will rapidly transition from a novel concept to a central tool in publishing. Its role will be critical not only in content creation and design but also in marketing and advertising. Publishers will increasingly recognize AI as indispensable for efficient and innovative operations.

As a result, we’ll see more media organizations exploring how to use it, starting with drafting guidelines for its use, with special attention to ethical issues to ensure professional standards are maintained. Training will take center stage, as publishers realize that when you train journalists today, you must also train their co-pilots — the robots sitting next to them. As AI becomes more a part of day-to-day operations in newsrooms, training programs will evolve to ensure journalists are equipped with the necessary skills to integrate AI effectively into their workflows. This dual training approach will aim to maximize the synergies between human creativity and AI’s analytical capabilities.

One of the primary lures of AI to publishers will be its ability to reduce costs and speed up production processes. By automating routine tasks, AI will enable faster content creation and distribution, providing a competitive edge in the fast-paced media landscape. The application of AI in media will become a global phenomenon, with newsrooms around the world adopting these technologies. This widespread adoption will likely lead to the development of industry standards and best practices for integrating AI into media operations, ensuring consistency and quality across different markets and platforms.

By the end of 2024, almost all media organizations will have adopted some level of AI strategy for content creation, marketing, and advertising. Hopefully, the copyright issues AI-created content have triggered will have progressed toward resolution and we will move on.

Journalists who are simply curious about AI now will be more well-versed in using AI to assist them by year’s end, especially with tasks such as data collection, brainstorming story ideas, crafting outlines of stories, and writing headlines. The dance between humans and robots in the newsroom will pick up the pace, as audiences become smarter about understanding the role that AI plays in content creation. The fears that some feel about AI will diminish as journalists realize that while AI is adept at handling large data sets, identifying patterns, and even drafting basic reports, it cannot match the human journalist’s ability to provide deep, nuanced insights that come from human experience and understanding. Human journalists can offer context, interpretation, and a level of analysis that AI cannot match. This makes their contributions more valuable and prestigious.

The human byline is likely to gain greater prestige as a symbol of quality, trustworthiness, and depth in journalism. So in the dance between humans and robots, the human will continue to lead.