Will AI Put Journalists Out of Work or Give Them a New Role?
Why do we need journalists if AI can write almost any text with little human involvement? But how can we trust media outlets that have lost their human touch? How can newsrooms strike a balance between using AI and the work of journalists? These questions were discussed at the session “AI in the Newsroom: Implementation, Opportunities and Risks,” held on October 10 as part of the Second Global Digital Forum.
Media representatives from Russia and countries of the Global South discussed how artificial intelligence algorithms can be used in daily newsroom work without compromising content quality or audience trust. AI already helps speed up and simplify information searches and fact-checking, while making content production easier. The challenge is to determine which tasks can be delegated to AI and which must remain the exclusive responsibility of human journalists.
Dmitry Fofanov, editor-in-chief of the IT-Russia media platform, one of the Global Digital Forum’s partners, said the outlet now reaches audiences in more than 70 countries. It publishes content in Russian and English and plans to add Spanish, Arabic and Chinese. The publication is open to cooperation with countries of the Global South and other friendly nations.
IT-Russia takes a cautious approach to AI: its articles are written exclusively by journalists. This helps the outlet pass automated filters used by various search services to detect AI-generated content and rank its articles among the top results. At the same time, the newsroom makes extensive use of neural networks to generate visual content for the platform.
“Artificial intelligence is neither a universal solution nor a threat. It is a tool, and everything depends on how a newsroom integrates it into its workflow,” Dmitry Fofanov stressed.
Alexey Gavrilko, deputy editor-in-chief of VEDY, a media outlet published by Vedomosti, said his newsroom makes extensive use of AI and even has its own AI-powered presenter, Valera. In this context, it is important for audiences to be able to clearly distinguish content created by human journalists from AI-generated material. AI is clearly a tool, and journalists need to know how to use it. The main risk for VEDY is that young writers may accept information generated by neural networks without questioning it. But AI brings opportunities as well as risks.
“I believe that if this tool did not exist, it would simply be impossible for us to produce the kind of content we offer in the market with the limited newsroom staff we have,” Alexey Gavrilko said.
Media outlets in African countries are also actively adopting AI technologies. Catalina Obono Mba Nchama, a journalist at Revista Real and editor-in-chief of the digital publication Egshine in Equatorial Guinea, explained that, unlike Russia, digital media in her country are still taking shape. Newsrooms devote considerable effort to identifying and exposing fake news, and play an important role in teaching the public to use technology responsibly. AI helps process information and generate social media content, but foreign models struggle with local context and cultural specifics.
“The biggest risk is the lack of context. We verify, check and make our own adjustments because we know our audience,” Catalina Obono Mba Nchama said.
Fame Fakeh Bunyui, CEO and publisher of Cameroon’s TECHFUSION MAGAZINE, also stressed the need to develop AI models trained on African languages and local data. AI technologies are already changing the region’s media landscape, but they also pose risks of distorting information and losing authenticity.
“Artificial intelligence will not replace journalists. The power and control are in your hands. We are the ultimate guardians of the truth,” Bunyui emphasized.
All the participants agreed that AI is a tool that is changing journalism but cannot replace it. It automates routine tasks, information searches and preliminary processing. But only humans can ask the right questions, create original content, fact-check information and take responsibility for published material in accordance with legal and ethical standards. The future of the media is not about chasing technology, but about preserving core values and audience trust.
