People think robot journalism is reliable

Readers think news items written by computer software are just as reliable and professional as items written by journalists. Most news consumers don’t see a difference in the quality, research by Tilburg University shows.

News consumers see ‘robot journalism’, where intelligent software gathers news and makes an item out of it, as a reliable and professional alternative for regular journalism. Journalists, however, think that people are more reliable for the job. This is the outcome of a study by Hille van der Kaa, assistent professor Transmedia Journalism, and Emiel Krahmer, professor in Language, Cognition and Computation.

Whether the robots are going to replace journalism, is a question that cannot be answered yet, Hille van der Kaa says. The high costs and the limited technical capacity of the software play a big part in the development of this technology. The researchers also found that machines do not have the capacity to avoid cliches and add humor.

Christer Clewall, scientist at Karstad University, sees robot journalism as a positive development. He conducted a research earlier this year. According to him, successful use of robot journalism will give journalists more time to focus on tasks they are qualified for. Short news items can be written by computers.

_Advertentie.