Microsoft Replaces Dozens of Staff With AI for News Stories on MSN

"Workforce automation is about to cost dozens of news contractors their jobs," writes Engadget: The Seattle Times and The Guardian report that Microsoft is letting go of dozens of news contractors (about 50 in the US, 27 in the UK) after June 30th due to a shift to AI news production on MSN. The workers were responsible for choosing, editing and curating stories.
The work included identifying trending news stories, planning content, and rewriting headlines, according to the Seattle Times. "It's been semi-automated for a few months but now it's full speed ahead,'' one of the terminated contractors tells them.

"It's demoralizing to think machines can replace us but there you go.''

I, for one...

[michelcolman]

I, for one, welcome our new news-manipulating robot overlords.

Re:I, for one...

[AmiMoJo]

Aside from the risk of one of them deciding Hitler did nothing wrong (like Microsoft's previous AI bot did), it seems like a great target for hackers.

It's also going to create a brand new industry of AI New Optimization, a bit like Search Engine Optimization where stories and press releases are written specifically to attract the attention of the algorithms.

Re:

[sheramil]

Aside from the risk of one of them deciding Hitler did nothing wrong (like Microsoft's previous AI bot did), it seems like a great target for hackers.

Gonna go way out on a limb here and suggest they'll minimise the system's exposure to 4chan or Qanon.

Depending on who they're selling stories to.

Re:

[paralumina01]

4chan is under the process of being rebranded into 4channel (SFW) and 4chan (NSFW). 4channel posters won't raid, and 4chan raids have been half-hearted at most for years now.

Re:

[paralumina01]

I would be surprised if this isn't already the case, which is why I am surprised to see this article as it is old news.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[DesScorp]

I, for one, welcome our new news-manipulating robot overlords.

And on the upside, it's Microsoft, so opportunities to Learn To Code are endless.

Re:

[MancunianMaskMan]

can it be worse than /. editors? At least, there is _artificial_ intelligence working for the new full-auto MSN.

Learn2Code

[Chas]

Looks like this is going to be all the rage in online "journalism".

Re: Look out /. Writers

[Way Smarter Than You]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/29/us/cnn-center-vandalized-protest-atlanta-destroyed/index.html

Yep, you can see from that video all the old white Christian boomers smashing cnn Windows.

*eye roll*

Watch the video. Don't let facts get in the way of a good bigoted rant.

And yes it took about 5 seconds to find video from cnn for this one you lazy goon.

That's what happens when you _really_ learn to cod

[melted]

That's what happens when you _really_ learn to code: you get replaced by your own program.

Tay v2.0

[thesjaakspoiler]

inflammatory and offensive news incoming in 3....2....1

For all that matters

[Unpopular Opinions]

The news of MSN will now be as good as the AI programmers want (see: Google search results). Only time will tell if we can finally say âwelcome back, Journalismâ(TM) or if this is going to be more of the same.

Hope it's as informative as Tay

[HalAtWork]

And Zo [wikipedia.org], they really had a knack for picking out some interesting bites

Ads, click baits and feeds

[overblod]

I dont think MSN has its own repoters, or news crew. If it's just managing news feeds from other sites and the click baits and ads, then I don't see the problem

Lunatics, asylum, running

[zkiwi34]

If they’re that confident of AI then I await their first release of SkyNet...

Google News never did...

[The New Guy 2.0]

Google started its news site with pure automation... MSN made the mistake of hiring staff before starting to automate. Temporary jobs make nobody happy.