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AI and its Impact of Media : Content Generation, Battling Fake News, Audience Engagement
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Rashi Mishra
3:05
Hello and welcome to Digital Media Conclave 2021, Day 3, organised by Digital Journalists Association of India. Today's panelist are Jency Jacob, Manging Editor, Boom and Jaskirat Singh Bawa, Head of Fact Checking Ops (India), Logically.
3:36
Dipti Kumar, the moderator, opens up the panel by asking whether it is technology or newsroom that influences the news.
3:39
"You need both technology and processes," says Jency Jacob. "There are many people who have posed this question. Why do you need fact checking as core enterprise in the newsroom?" he questions.
3:40
He further adds that if the executives in newsrooms had woken up to disinformation earlier, this wouldn't be plaguing anyone right now. The mainstream media was completely unaware of this for the longest time.
3:42
Jency Jacob on combating disinformation
3:43
"Speed is something that has paid a premium at the cost of fact checking and that is part of the problem," he opines.
3:45
On being asked how one can better utilise AI tools, Jaskirat Singh Bawa says that once the intent shifts from not getting it first but getting it right, AI can be used to capitalise on getting both processes to take place simultaneously.
3:47
He goes on to discuss how human efficiency is going down because of the sheer volume of information that is being dealt with.
3:48
Bawa: "Allowing human filter in fact checking gets the job done faster."
3:52
Jacob moves on to discuss that there was a time when newspapers used to decide the agenda of the day. Then came the television. However, now the agenda and the narratives are driven by social media.
3:54
Asian Journal for Public Opinion Research (2019)
3:57
"The buck should stop at the editors," he says. He emphasises on the need to regulate media is not by using the law to go after the media. The government cannot decide that which content is good and which is bad. Therefore, the answer is not to restrict the freedom of the media but self-regulation.
4:00
On India’s low ranking on the Global Press Freedom Index, Bawa says that the control over media is tempting both in a democratic country and a totalitarian regime.
4:07
Answering Dipti on the accountability of media, Bawa says that he hopes that in the long run the digitalisation of India would make people even in the farthest corner get access to a wide stream of information. It is the responsibility of the fact-checkers to deliver the correct information.
4:08
4:09
"As far as accountability is concerned, it has to start at the newsroom. The ground reporters get the brunt of flak as they are the foot soldiers," Jacob emphasises.
4:10
4:12
The panel moves on to analyse reinforcement of self-regulation of media and whether the government should use disincentives instead of laws.
4:13
Jacob: "As far as TV channels are concerned, we must have a dialogue with these media organisations to give them a feeling that the government is not out to get them but to work with them to keep misinformation at bay."
4:14
Do you agree that accountability needs to begin at the newsrooms?
Yes (100% | 2 votes)
 
No (0% | 0 votes)
 
Total Votes: 2
4:21
Emphasising on the importance of the artificial intelligence (AI), Bawa says that AI and fact checking are at a very early stage. There have been mistakes where there have been misidentification of innocent people because of over dependence on AI process.
4:23
Responding to a question from the audience, Bawa says that one has to do away with the notion that AI is the end all of all our problems. It is a technological solution that would act as a means to an end in the long run.
4:25
"Don't be a fossil. Don't carry baggages of the past. We need to be technologically agnostic and constantly learn, relearn and unlearn how we understand technology," concludes Jacob.
4:26
That's all from the panel. Thank you for joining us.
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