A Norwegian newspaper — Bergens Tidende – got the nod as a finalist in the automated news category for the upcoming 2021 Global Media Awards.
The media outlet turned judges’ heads with a new real estate section written entirely by robots.
The AI tool behind the news section is designed to give real estate shoppers, such as home buyers, basic data about a house they’re considering, its surrounding neighborhood — and even its surrounding region.
Probably one of the most innovative features of the AI-generated writing system is its on-screen, zoom-for-more-information tool.
Essentially: The more you zoom-out with the tool on your computer screen, the more information you retrieve about a specific property.
Zoom Level 1 examination of a house sale, for example, offers you basic info about the house, along with aerial photos of the property drawn from a huge Norwegian database. Also included are 3D panoramic images and street views of the property sourced from Google.
Zoom-out to Level 2 and you’ll find more text populating your screen, detailing the number of house sales in the neighborhood, the average home sales in the neighborhood and similar.
Zoom-out a bit more to Level 3 and you’re treated to reports on house sales and similar for the region — as well as a report on the 10 biggest house sales in the municipality.
Level 3 also offers Norway’s largest cities a 10-year historic look back at real estate sales activity.
The system, powered by AI-generated writing from United Robots, is averaging 3,000-5,000 views-a-day, according to the publication.
It also uses an automated headline system, which instantly picks what the system considers to be the best headline to use for each automated text.
The system also completely eliminates the need for headline editors, according to the publication.
Besides becoming a hit with readers, the automated texts are providing the newspaper’s journalists with new insights, as well as fodder for real estate stories written the old-fashioned way — by hand –according to the publication.
Winners of the 2021 Global Media Awards — squired by the International News Media Association — are slated to be announced June 3.
INMA is a community of 16,000+ members from 850 media companies across 70 countries.
In other AI-generated writing news:
*Will a Robot Write The Great American Novel?: While automated writing makes Laura Smith nervous, she still believes humans have a decided advantage over machines when it comes to writing fiction.
Specifically: Empathy.
Deputy editor of California Magazine, Smith observes: “Machines may have access to nearly infinite knowledge, yet our meaning-making capabilities are far superior.
“But if, for now, AI-generated art strikes us as uninspired, it’s also true that, through machine learning, the technology is constantly improving itself, leaving open the possibility that one day, it could learn to empathize — to synthesize this thing we call soul.
“Until then, we are the beautiful machines.”
Smith offers an in-depth examination of automated writing’s impact on fiction in this article.
*Wall Street Journal Experimenting With Automated Article Drafts: The Journal is toying with a new AI tool that auto-generates draft stories detailing the tone and direction of the world’s financial markets.
Writers from the Journal observe that using the auto-generated drafts, “a reporter can layer on analysis and insight — producing a richer story faster.
“With the computer focusing on the ‘what,’ our reporters can focus on the ‘why.’
“We made the decision to follow this type of automation because we know our members value the insight our reporters bring to our journalism, and wanted to help our reporters get there faster.”
The Journal has been using AI to help automate the production of news since the mid-teens.
*AI-Powered Report Writing Tool Snags Funding: AI-generated writing start-up Contents has snagged $6 million in funding to aid in expansion beyond U.S., Spain, France, UK and Italy.
Content uses AI to sift through data and unearth auto-written trend reports — which are shared with users and search engines.
(For an in-depth look at the trend in auto-generated company reports, check-out, “Company Reports That Write Themselves,” by Joe Dysart.
*AI Journalism World Forum Live March 29: The two-day virtual Artificial Intelligence Journalism World Forum goes live on the Web today.
Running March 29-30, the virtual event — streaming from Dubai — will feature more than 200 participants, academics and media experts,” says Mohammed Ali Shouman, president, the Global Artificial Intelligence Journalism Forum (GAIJF).
“Academics will represent universities and research centers from the United States and Europe, as well as regional universities from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait and Bahrain,” Shouman says.
Adds Mohamed Abdulzaher, CEO, GAIJF: The GAIJF plans to “explore the era of artificial intelligence journalism and 7G journalism, by presenting real experiences for international media in the use of AI technologies in editing and writing processes, data analysis, detection of fake news, use of 3D printing, big data analysis, data journalism, and other technologies of 4IR related to media.”
*AI Aftermath: Are Editors an Endangered Species?: As AI pervades the news business, editors are finding that more people are having the final say on what will be the news of the day, according to Ben Whitlaw, a media strategist.
Observes Whitlaw: “Over the past decade, the process and personnel involved in commissioning stories have changed.”
Data journalists, visual specialists and multimedia experts are augmenting editors’ ideas, Whitlaw notes.
Meanwhile, those with expertise in tracking online audiences are using their insights to find new readers or listeners in the digital world.
And still other teams of product experts, data scientists and marketing professionals are tweaking subscription offers and optimizing Web design to boost readership, he adds.
Even so, Whitlaw sees a place for editors as AI proliferates across the media.
Observes Whitlaw: ” We are into the ‘existential innovation’ phase (of AI-aided news production), which raises tough questions: What are editors for? What does their job fundamentally entail?
“How can we arm them with data and insight to make the stories they commission have an impact on the reader — and thus the business?
“As the automated world gains pace, the answers might not be as scary as they think.”
*Expert: The Future of News is Hybrid Authorship: Editors and writers nervously eyeing the automation of writing can relax, according to Jack Clark, an AI expert.
He predicts news authorshp in coming years will be a hybrid affair – requiring both AI and humans.
Observes Clark: “The way it’s really going to happen is that you’ll have an AI assistant in the newsroom that just suggests different headlines, and a human will just pick one.
“So it’s not going to be some dramatic ‘now there’s an AI journalist.’ It’s going to be much more be like, ‘oh, humans are now teaming up with AI to generate cultural outputs.’
It’s a reassuring view – even if it’s one that not all share.
(For an in-depth, 2021 look at how robots are replacing editors and writers across virtually all writing genres, check out, “The Robots Cometh: How artificial intelligence is automating writing jobs,” by Joe Dysart.
*Presenters Needed: Symposium on AI and the Law: The Legal Writing Institute has put out a call for presenters for its upcoming “Symposium on Artificial Intelligence and the Legal Profession.”
The goal of the symposium is to bring together legal scholars, practicing lawyers, technology experts, and others to discuss how rapidly developing technologies are affecting legal research and writing processes, the practice of law generally, the ethics of practice, legal education and access to justice.
Both single speaker and panel presentations are being sought.
Deadline for proposed presentations is April 5, 2021.
The symposium is slated for September 24 and 25 at Northwestern University’s Pritzker School of Law.
*MS Word’s Predictive Text: Not for Everyone: Count Chris Matyszcyk among those who are bugged by wordprocessing that auto-suggests words and phrases as you type.
His gut reaction to much of the predictive text Microsoft Word suggests: “Here’s Microsoft telling you it’ll take some wordy burden from your fatigued brain by trying to type gibberwocky — I just made up that word — on your behalf.”
Bottom line: “If the mere description of a service is already annoying you, perhaps using that service will have an exponentially negative effect,” Matyszcyk observes.
*New Book: “Algorithms, Automation, and News:” A group of scholars are poised to release an updated 2021 look at how algorithims and automation are remaking the news business.
Dubbed, “Algorithms, Automation, and News,” the tome drops May 21.
Here’s a peek at the Table of Contents:
- Algorithms, Automation, and News
- On the Democratic Role of News Recommenders
- Newsbots That Mediate Journalist and Audience Relationships
- Public Service Chatbots: Automating Conversation with BBC News
- Selling News to Audiences – A Qualitative Inquiry into the Emerging Logics of Algorithmic News Personalization in European Quality News Media
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–Joe Dysart is editor of RobotWritersAI.com and a tech journalist with 20+ years experience. His work has appeared in 150+ publications, including The New York Times and the Financial Times of London.