The Newsroom of the Future

Artificial intelligence has thrown all sorts of issues up for journalists ethically, editorially and practically. It is actually a threat to journalism if we are not out ahead of it. I recently spoke Candyce Kelshall, President of the Canadian Association of Security and Intelligence Studies, who indicated that the newsroom of the future would look very much like an intelligence agency, sifting through what information is out there, what's important and what can go to air. Reporters, producers and associate producers have certain skills sets that may no longer suffice on their own.

A new layer of a newsroom needs to be considered. An Intelligence Hub. A new skilled team would need to know how to manage structured analytic techniques, make key assumption checks and develop models on verifying the quality of info generated by AI. And all that information has to be fact checked properly before dissemination. The roles look like this:

A Fusion Analyst. This role would give the first snapshot of the day.

An Advanced Analyst. This role would determine what information is important and what’s not. This is a train analyst who understands information technology. Candyce tells me "This is not someone with a copy editing, writing, grammar or legal skill. This talent must know how to assess information. How to disseminate information after being put through checks and balances."

Pure Fact checker. This role checks and double checks information from various sources using technology and tools.

These trained analysts make sure that AI generated information is factual, and grapple with misinformation, disinformation and deep fakes. Like this image of an anchor in the field... :)