Axios House: There's a time and place for AI in media
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Photographer Nicolas Gavet for Axios
CANNES, France — AI is for operations, not content creation, media executives said at a June 25 Axios event.
Why it matters: Wielding AI strategically for business partnerships and efficiency can help ensure the media industry's survival.
Axios' Sara Fischer and Kerry Flynn moderated conversations with iHeartMedia Digital Audio Group CEO Conal Byrne and The Associated Press president and CEO Daisy Veerasingham. The event was sponsored by AWS.
Flashback: The Associated Press was among the first publishing companies to strike a deal with artificial intelligence firm OpenAI.
What they're saying: The AP has three principles for its approach to AI, according to Veerasingham.
- "Our intellectual property has to be protected … our intellectual property has to receive fair value …and our reporting starts with a human journalist and it finishes with a human journalist," she said.
Zoom in: "You can use AI to help the production process, the capacity process, and that's a really important part of how you version content for new and different markets," she said.
- "The way that we research, develop, produce and distribute our podcast content … is absolutely largely AI-driven today," Byrne said.
Stunning stat: The AP produces "5,000 individual pieces of journalism every single day, and our journalism touches half of the world's population," Veerasingham said.
What's next: Veerasingham expects more multi-year licensing deals — a more comfortable and sustainable business model for media outlets.
Content from the sponsor's segment:
In a View From the Top conversation, AWS global specialists and partners vice president Ruba Borno says the technology "helps us prioritize our time — our only non-renewable asset and our only non-renewable resource — to be used on the highest-impact activities."
