Hadley Bodell
Editor in Chief
It feels repetitive to once again mention the impact AI continues to have on almost every field of work in the world. It has, however, influenced nearly every corner of journalism, even our micro-scale publication here at The Bengal.
It’s no secret generative AI can write an article faster than a journalist. It would’ve had this column written days before I got around to it. The appeal of AI is its efficiency and ability to scour internet sources in a matter of seconds.
Researcher Amanda Downie at IBM wrote, “Already, news publishers like the New York Times, Associated Press, the Washington Post, ESPN and Semafor have been open about investing in initiatives to explore how AI technology can be used alongside human journalists.”
The term “alongside” is not unfamiliar to reporters, as we’ve been using transcription bots like Otter and other technologies for social media monitoring in newsrooms for years. The concern with using a generative AI like ChatGPT or Grok is the accidental publishing of misinformation.
The AI technology can be hijacked by bad actors to produce deepfakes — generated media including images, audio or video that are highly convincing and often used for scams — and misinformation. For journalists deeply rooted in their craft of integrity, genuine reporting, and a commitment to unbiased and factual writing, this incorporation of AI causes serious anxiety.
I’ve spent time wondering if the job I have worked so hard to get to through my journalism degree will soon be obsolete, superseded by an artificial intelligence.
Just this week, ISU announced students can now achieve a Bachelor’s of Artificial Intelligence Sciences. The major will be shared between the departments of Math and Statistics and Computer Science. ISU says this will help address the growing demand for AI professionals. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment in the field of AI Sciences is projected to grow by 34 percent by 2034.
“It is designed to give students both the theoretical background and the applied skills necessary to contribute meaningfully to the rapidly growing field of artificial intelligence,” said Emanuele Zappala, assistant professor in mathematics and statistics.
Overseas in the UK, AI has been rapidly incorporated into the media space. A study by the Reuters Institute and the University of Oxford found that 16% of journalists answered “yes” to using AI to generate parts of their text articles like a headline. Ten percent of reporters admitted to using AI to generate first drafts of articles.
This idea of a “first draft edit” is where the line with using generative AI is crossed. For writers, our identity, talent and passion for our work comes from finding our own voices and writing style. A large part of being a journalist is the research and original interviews required to write an article, however, the work post-interviews involves writing candid and concise prose. You may notice when you read a specific writers’ piece, it “sounds” like them.
AI-generated writing is lifeless, opinionless, and frankly boring to read. This is why, at The Bengal Newspaper, we have prided ourselves on producing original, human-written content. Unfortunately, a writer on staff chose to use generative AI to write their articles. Not only this, but the software also generated and quoted students at our university that don’t exist using false names and majors. Even worse, it fabricated and attributed quotes to real students. Needless to say, those quotes were never said.
As Editor in Chief, I am embarrassed that any of this content was published. It undermines the integrity of what we stand for as the independent voice of Idaho State, as well as the point of journalism itself as a craft. Who are we if we don’t write our own pieces, speak to real students, and provide our audience with unbiased and true information?
The AI-generated articles have been removed from The Bengal Newspaper website and the published newspapers containing those articles have been removed from circulation. The impacted students have been contacted.
Idaho State University is currently working to create an AI policy, which will be adopted university-wide. The Bengal is crafting our own AI guidelines in concordance with the university’s to ensure this never happens again.
