Can artificial intelligence be a journalist? This is the question that many authoritative commentators have pondered, and it’s a question the interns at the Zeta editorial team have also considered. What can be done is to become journalists of the digital age, riding the events instead of passively waiting for developments.
In January 2023, just two months after the launch of ChatGPT, the Master’s interns produced the first magazine entirely created with artificial intelligence (you can read it here). Its creation was a full-fledged experiment (not coincidentally titled “Experiment“), involving hypotheses, trials, and progressive adjustments. If anyone thinks that writing an article with artificial intelligence is a walk in the park, simply instructing the system to “write a piece on…” will be disappointed. With a request that is too vague, the text will be flat and banal, and it will be difficult to extract something worth reading. Sometimes, it is necessary to ask multiple questions and then request a summary using the correct prompts. Without input from the journalist, the machine remains inert, and finding an original idea is crucial to fully harness its potential. The creative mind remains human, while the generative part is entrusted to the machine.
Upon its completion, the magazine was deemed a success, and its pioneering nature was recognized by major national newspapers, such as *La Repubblica*, which dedicated one of its Sunday longform articles to it. The magazine contains sections with hypothetical futures and parallel realities, dialogues, and articles from prominent writers of the past discussing today’s events. According to ChatGPT itself, at least so far, its articles may “lack the creativity, nuances, and perspective that human writers bring to the table,” along with the risk that some passages may be inaccurate or incorrect. There is no choice between accepting progress or rejecting it; there is only the crossroads of learning to use new technologies or being overwhelmed by them. The key is to continue experimenting because technology moves faster than any human process. Since the release of “Experiment,” OpenAI has already upgraded ChatGPT from the GTP-3 language model to GPT-4, with generative power hundreds of times greater. Other major companies have entered the AI race, producing increasingly sophisticated tools for the students of the new biennium to work with.
The editorial team of the 2021/2023 biennium also created an AI avatar capable of launching news segments. What will be the future challenges for the Zeta editorial team? Enroll in the Master’s program and let’s discover it together!
Read the call for applications and check the available scholarships.