Author: John Biggs
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Brian Morrissey on How Media Can Survive in the Generative AI Era
It’s still early days for generative AI, but the change it will inevitably impose on content-based industries like news media is massive. Even as newsrooms grapple with the mechanics and ethics of deploying the technology, it’s already having an effect on the bigger industry of “content,” effectively bringing the cost to produce text, audio and…
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White House Executive Order on AI: What It Means for Media
Credit: Donghun Shin, Unsplash As expected, the White House issued a wide-ranging executive order on AI this morning. By most measures, the action is an earnest attempt to get ahead of the technology, with an emphasis on protecting people’s privacy and safety while ensuring the companies developing AI can still innovate (seeing a geopolitical rival…
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The Looming Standoff Between Big Tech and the Media Over Generative Search
The rise of Search Generative Experience (SGE) could mean the return to a more federated web. (Credit: Adobe Firefly) As generative AI tools like ChatGPT get more popular by the day, there’s a serious, obvious problem that publishers face: the dominance of “zero click” searches. Put simply, when Google (and, OK sure, Bing) gets so…
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In Conversation: Jeremy Caplan on Customizing the News With AI
The Media Copilot podcast is evolving. As of today, I’m mixing up the format, adding a news briefing at the beginning. For that briefing I’m joined by fellow tech journalist John Biggs, a builder of many AI tools himself, including Typewriter Plus. Why am I adding a news briefing to the podcast? The fact is…
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In Conversation: Thomas Seymat on Teaching AI to Journalism Students
In this week’s conversation, I talk to Thomas Seymat of Euronews on teaching the next generation of journalism students in a world where AI is on the rise. Plus John Biggs and I break down the week’s news, zeroing in on the White House executive order. Perhaps the people best positioned to thrive in tomorrow’s…
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How Elon Musk’s Grok Could Make X Great Again… for News
Credit: Daniel Oberhaus, Flickr Creative Commons; Bing Image Creator In an otherwise uneventful weekend (at least with respect to AI), Elon Musk unveiled Grok, a generative AI tool meant to rival the likes of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Meta’s Llama. Grok is the product of xAI, a company Musk spun up in July to “understand the…
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Will News Publishers Need to Play in OpenAI’s GPT App Store?
Credit: Bing Image Creator OpenAI’s big DevDay event this week was eye-opening in many ways. CEO Sam Altman wasn’t lying when he said in advance there was “some great new stuff” in store planned even though GPT-5 wasn’t on the table. He blazed through several big unveilings in the opening minutes, many relevant to media…
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Putting AI Where Reporters Actually Work, With Ryan Restivo
There are thousands of generative AI tools for content, and some actually work well. Generative tools can create SEO headlines, social copy, document analysis, and lots more for reporters and editors, all ready to enhance your productivity. However, there are roadblocks to incorporating these tools in day-to-day work. Beyond the basic concerns about quality and…
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Humane’s Ai Pin Could Alexa-ify News
Credit: Humane I ask Alexa every morning for the weather. One of the Amazon Echo smart speakers scattered around my house hears my request and responds in Alexa’s default female voice, summarizing the current temperature and how it will change throughout the day. This sort of experience — ask a digital assistant (remember when we called…
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The Harsh Reality of Synthetic Content
Credit: Adobe Firefly Is the image above AI-generated? The red play button kind of gives it away, but if I hadn’t credited Adobe Firefly, you might think that’s a real dude staring into computer screen showing some kind of golden-hour YouTube video. The ethics of AI disclosure got a big jolt this week. YouTube announced…