Google developing AI tools to help journalists report the news

Google is developing artificial intelligence-enabled tools to help journalists research and write news articles, a development that is likely to rattle nerves across the media industry after years of painful job cuts. Google is working with media outlets, particularly with small publishers, to provide AI-powered tools to assist journalists with "options for headlines or different writing styles", the California-based tech giant said on Thursday. "Our goal is to give journalists the choice of using these emerging technologies in a way that enhances their work and productivity, just like we're making assistive tools available for people in Gmail and in Google Docs," Google spokeswoman Jenn Crider said in a statement, which described the company's "earliest stages of exploring ideas". "Quite simply, these tools are not intended to, and cannot, replace the essential role journalists have in reporting, creating, and fact-checking their articles." The global media industry has been decimated by successive rounds of layoffs amid a collapse in print advertising revenues, with US newsrooms alone shedding a record 17,436 jobs in the first five months of 2023.