Keir Taylor, PR & Marketing Assistant:

• What AI is capable of
• Misconceptions about AI 
• How and why human nature still conquers AI-generated content 

The advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has led many to believe, including myself, that we’re now living in the future that we all dreamed of in sci-fi films. With AI-generated content in music, art and photography, it’s hard not to be amazed at just how cool it is, and how far we’ve come in such a short space of time. More than ever, creative ideas are easier to bring to life; this had me wondering, “could AI soon replace me?”.

To a business, AI may represent a cheaper and perhaps more efficient alternative. Recently, BuzzFeed laid off 15% of its staff to opt for AI-generated content, which, at the time, seemed to be a huge symbolic shift in how online content was created. Immediately after this announcement, BuzzFeed’s stock price tripled up to $3.87 per share; however, at time of writing, their stock price sits at an unimpressive $0.18 per share. A far cry from what investors thought would be a turning point for the ailing news site. So, what happened?

Well, it turns out that AI-generated content isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. To those who are new to AI programmes, it seems like a sort of magic that is able to create content out of thin air with very little human input. For example, upon release ChatGPT was hailed as the future of writing, seemingly able to concoct anything we want it to at the inclusion of a few rules and a click of a button. 

However, this isn’t the case; AI doesn’t understand your company, it understands data. Data from online sources, from users all over the world and from you, to essentially predict what it is you’re asking it to do.

For writing news, this sounds pretty ideal. A programme that can trawl through the Internet for content written about a certain event, and create a summary to replicate the style of existing media – and with no political bias! It’s clever, but this leaves very little room for originality. This is a problem that BuzzFeed has encountered time and time again, repetitive content that doesn’t capture the imagination of its audience, seemingly unable to think outside the box. Alongside this, AI can be susceptible to disinformation due to pulling information from various sources, which can at times include plagiarism. Humans surpass AI in every aspect for engaging, creative writing by being able to harness tone of voice, style, and offer original ideas. 

Thinking outside the box, or creativity, is a very human quality. Being able to take your experience and expertise to create content that stands out from the rest to capture an audience’s attention is something that AI fundamentally lacks.

Humans are capable of being brave and bold, breaking norms and expectations to create something that stands the test of time. To be dynamic, interesting and creative is to be human. In the world of content creation, these very unique human traits are at the forefront of the skills we need, and are far from being a skill that AI possesses.

For now, I think it’s safe to say that human-generated content is here to stay.