We know about driverless cars, but are reporterless stories just around the corner too? And what does a "true-blue Aussie" robot reading the news sound like? (spoiler: not good)
Photo: AFP
https://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/en/about/ourdepartment/gibbons-lectures.html#414413851cca423ccad5e0c7f41fbcab
Learning machines may change the way we live in ways most of us don’t yet understand - including journalists.
Assoc Prof of computer science at University of Auckland Ian Watson ponders the consequences of ethics of artificial intelligence when he closes the Gibbons Lectures on 25th of May at the University of Auckland.
On Radio Live’s Ian Watson told host Graeme Hill it isn't just hospital porters and shelf-stackers likely to lose their jobs soon to robots and smart computers
"Smug . . .
And which smug middle class jobs did he have in mind?
"Accountancy, law, journalism . .. mundane," xx
Interesting opinion.
Accountancy. sure. That’s just numbers.
The law? Well that’s all written down for any computer to scan and take on board. No problem with that.
But although parts of journalism may be mundane, as Prof watson said there - surely they still require the human mind - and all these skills journalists learn at tertiary institutions and then refine on the job over years and years of journalism?
Maybe not any more.
Prof. Watson told Graeme Hill he had a mate in the US who ran a company that takes sports stats from the news wires and writes sports stories for publication.
Tuesday was a great day for W. Roberts, as the junior pitcher threw a perfect game to carry Virginia to a 2-0 victory over George Washington at Davenport Field.
Twenty-seven Colonials came to the plate and the Virginia pitcher vanquished them all, pitching a perfect game. He struck out 10 batters while recording his momentous feat. Roberts got Ryan Thomas to ground out for the final out of the game.
Tom Gately came up short on the rubber for the Colonials, recording a loss. He went three innings, walked two, struck out one, and allowed two runs.
"You can't tell they were written by a computer," he said.
Yikes.
It sounded familiar to Mediawatch.
The game in question was played in 2011.
While striking out ten batters in a row is extraordinary, the one-eyed human writer of a story about the game for the website of the vanquished George Washington University churlishly didn't mention that feat until the very end of the story.
the AI specialist at Chicago-based Narrative Science, ("We live at the intersection of technology and humanity, where the two come together to make each other better".
http://deadspin.com/5787397/we-heard-from-the-robot-and-it-wrote-a-better-story-about-that-perfect-game
Prof Wilson went on to say the appeal of this for bosses of the modern media was obvious:
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 4 far
Or not so far out - just around the corner, possibly.
But Prof watson also told Graeme Hill smart computers are still very limited in one respect that is important to humans:
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 5 emotional
And siri’s jokes are not good jokes.
So while learning machines may be able to write basic news reports, they’ll never be broadcasters.
Or will they?
Back in January 2016, an executive left the Austrlian radio network Macquarie to launch an online podcasting platform called Whooshkaa.
The idea was to help Australia’s bloggers, podcasters, publishers and personalities to attract a bigger audience and advertising.
This week Robert Loewenthal claimed a world-first for Whooshkaa: instant audio podcasts direct from text:
VOICEOVER 4:
”Whooshkaa is using artificial intelligence and machine learning to automatically convert stories and news feeds into audio.. Publishers can now generate a comprehensive news bulletin in real time, combining the top stories of the day into a single podcast.”
And not only that; Whooshkaa can do this for its clients in what it calls two true-blue Aussie voices:
VOICEOVER 5:
“Nicole” is ready to read you the latest news highlights the moment your favourite publication writes them. Or perhaps “Russell” might be more soothing to your ears.
And so you can judge that, Whooskaa put robot Rusell to work reading out the announcement of this supposed world first in podcasting.
How soothing to your ears is his true blue Aussie digital delivery?
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 6 russell
Thanks for that Russell.
While we haven’t heard Nicole yet, we can only assume she doesn;t sound any more soothing to the ear than his obviously robotic tones.
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 7 podcast
So nice try Russel but it’s not likely many media companies are going to go for that.
We know about driverless cars, but are reporterless stories just around the corner too? And what does a "true-blue Aussie" robot reading the news sound like? (spoiler: not good)
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 8 clients
Thanks Russell, well leave it there.
AUDIO: 21 May 2017 ARTIFICIAL 9 coming
Thanks Russell like I said - that;’s enough of that
Tha’s all
