HIGHLY POTENT NEWS THAT MIGHT CHANGE YOUR VIEWS

Robots To Replace Journalists In The Future?

by Terry Wilson
Canadian Awareness Network

March 27, 2013

It does not take much to be a main stream propaganda personality. I mean let’s be honest here. It is not hard to regurgitate the propaganda that is spoon fed to them. Apparently it is so easy a computer or robot may take their jobs in the future!

‘Robo-reporter’ raises questions about future of journalists
By Jesse M. Kelly, Postmedia News
vancouversun.com

Journalist Ken Schwencke has occasionally awakened in the morning to find his byline atop a news story he didn’t write.

No, it’s not that his employer, The Los Angeles Times, is accidentally putting his name atop other writers’ articles. Instead, it’s a reflection that Schwencke, digital editor at the respected U.S. newspaper, wrote an algorithm — that then wrote the story for him.

Instead of personally composing the pieces, Schwencke developed a set of step-by-step instructions that can take a stream of data — this particular algorithm works with earthquake statistics, since he lives in California — compile the data into a pre-determined structure, then format it for publication.

His fingers never have to touch a keyboard; he doesn’t have to look at a computer screen. He can be sleeping soundly when the story writes itself.

Just call him robo-reporter.

“I doubt that people who read our (web) posts — unless they religiously read the earthquake posts and realize they almost universally follow the same pattern — would notice,” Schwencke said. “I don’t think most people are thinking that robots are writing the news.”

But in this case, they are. And that has raised questions about the future of flesh-and-blood journalists, and about journalism ethics.

Algorithms are fairly versatile, and have been doing a great number of things we sometimes don’t even think about, from beating us at computerized chess, to auto-correcting our text messages.
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What does that say about the current state of the main stream? A computer algorithm can do their job. Of course this is only for basic stories at this point. But everything has to start somewhere, and with the ways that our society/technology is progressing. Who knows where this could end up!

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