Monday 18th September: With democracy on the ballot, the mainstream press must change its ways

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As AI advances continue to disrupt the way we work, there are many questions from news and media organisations: What will be the impact of AI on audience expectations? How can we maintain trust in our news content in the AI era?

Reuters sheds light on these questions in an exclusive report: Powering Trusted News with AI: Navigating the present and shaping the future.

The report explores the role of AI in news and journalism and offers practical advice on how AI can help streamline your processes.

I’m nervous, I’m very nervous. Following the Capitol riots I was convinced that the press in general had learned a lesson about covering candidates who make denigrating the media a central tenet of their campaigns. Surely, surely, surely another Trump wouldn’t be possible, simply because we’ve all learned that lesson the hard way.

Well, no, at least not according to Margaret Sullivan: “The big problem is that the mainstream media wants to be seen as non-partisan – a reasonable goal – and bends over backwards to accomplish this. If this means equalizing an anti-democratic candidate with a pro-democracy candidate, then so be it.”

Bloody hell. Let’s leave aside the fact that objectivity isn’t possible — and shouldn’t even be striven for when one candidate makes racism and discrimination their main appeal. Instead, let’s focus on the fact that pursuing that approach was exactly what let Trump bash the press the first time. You can’t appease people who hate journalists through giving up ground, so this time round let’s not even try.

Always great to read some practical advice for how journalists can use a social network more effectively — particularly when it’s a remit for my new role! As this journalism.co.uk article explains (and I sort-of wrote about last year) LinkedIn has been steadily building out tools for journalists for years now. The Juliana Chan example is particularly enlightening.

Much to think about following the airing of Dispatches and the accompanying Times & Sunday Times article — not least how Brand appears to have been able to prey on young women in plain sight for years. It’ll be the scantest comfort for his victims, but it’s good that investigations are now underway at organisations that previously employed him. Light is the best disinfectant, no matter how painful.

Ah, ****. For what little it’s worth i.e. absolutely nothing in practical terms, our thoughts go out to the journalists and other staff involved in this latest nightmare. "The media industry continues to face existential challenges, largely because digital tech giants have used their dominant positions to take the vast majority of the advertising revenue in Canada," the company said in a statement.

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