AI may shore up an industry experiencing economic headwinds. But in a field where professional ethics and public trust are particularly important, it’s a risky endeavor.
Kent Cooper worked for the Associated Press for over four decades, changing the news media landscape in the process.
(Shutterstock)
During Cooper’s long tenure as a senior executive, general manager and executive director, he changed the Associated Press and the news its readers and listeners depended on, in major ways.
Terrified children, including 9-year-old Kim Phuc, center, near Trang Bang, Vietnam, after a South Vietnamese plane on June 8, 1972, accidentally dropped its flaming napalm on its own troops and civilians.
AP Photo/Nick Ut, File
The ‘Napalm Girl’ photo is much more than powerful evidence of war’s indiscriminate effects on civilians. It also shows how false assertions can get traction in the media.
Reporting about minor crimes is about to change.
Illustration by kali9/iStock/Getty Images Plus
The Associated Press will no longer name those arrested in minor crimes when the news service is unlikely to cover the story’s resolution. That’s a major shift in US news culture.
‘I’m here so I don’t get fined,’ Seattle Seahawks’ star running back Marshawn Lynch repeatedly told a Jan. 27, 2015, press conference on media day for NFL Super Bowl XLIX. And then he left.
AP Photo/Charlie Riedel
Athletes no longer need the press to communicate with fans. They can do that directly through social channels – and unless sports reporters do a better job asking questions, they may become obsolete.
Chicago Mayor Richard Daley – shown yelling – cried bias in the media’s coverage of the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Library of Congress
The accusation of bias is like kryptonite for responsible news organizations: the stronger their piety to the ideal of objectivity, the more vulnerable they are to complaints made in bad faith.
States, casinos and leagues could all cash in. Will sports media get a cut of the action too?
Soifer/Shutterstock.com
With bettors clamoring for an edge, legacy media outlets could add a gambling beat to their daily sports coverage – or risk losing out.
Canadian Artillery gunners read the Victory issue of the Maple Leaf newspaper in Germany after Germany surrenders.
REUTERS/Lieut. Donald I. Grant /Canada Department of National Defence/Library and Archives Canada/PA-150931
It has been a bad couple of weeks for social media and Twitter in particular. The degree of misinformation spread by social media sites in the aftermath of the bombings at the Boston marathon has given…