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You can’t turn on a media podcast, read a media newsletter or attend a media event without everyone talking about AI. So… I’m about to do the same!
Let’s get the throat clearing out of the way first. AI is clearly going to have a huge impact on news and the rest of the media. It is already doing so, albeit not always successfully – take the morale-sapping effect I reported it’s had at Reach, for instance. However, I’m no luddite. This technology has good uses already and more are going to emerge.
Today, The Lenfest Institute for Journalism, OpenAI and Microsoft announced that they are collaborating with Open AI and Microsoft to help local newsrooms use AI. They are initially giving money to Chicago Public Media, Newsday, The Minnesota Star Tribune, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Seattle Times. Those organisations can use the cash to work together and run selected projects. Will this save local media? No? Is it worth a try? Sure.
Teens Don’t Care About AI Tools
The thing is, the news consumer of the future does not seem to be taken with AI tools yet. A recent report by the News Literacy Project found that just 23% of teens use generative AI chatbots – things like ChatGPT, Gemini or Copilot – on at least a weekly basis. That number is just 9% for AI image generators. “These findings challenge the notion that AI tools have already upended the way young people approach schoolwork,” the researchers write.
More pertinent to news consumption, the report found:
When asked if they trust generative AI chatbots to produce information that is accurate and fair, many teens were skeptical. Only 36% of teens report having at least a fair amount of trust in these tools to generate accurate information, while half of teens report having little to no trust in the accuracy and fairness of these AI tools.
This is a generation growing up on parasocial relationships with influencers. A generation that regards authenticity as key and doesn’t trust or care about the mainstream media very much. How is a greater use of AI going to bring them back into the fold?
There are experiments taking place in UK newsrooms too. Work from Enders Analysis earlier this month found plenty of reasonable use cases, but also significant issues to ponder. They warned against thinking that AI will solve all revenue-generating problems. They also noted that “challenges around AI messaging are not isolated from other trust in media challenges, though they may exacerbate them.”
Indeed.
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