Robots Write the News (but I still write this blog!)

Robots write the news and this isn't anything new, even though it was new to me. 3 minutes after an earthquake strikes in California, the LA Times can break the story written by an earthquake algorithm nicknamed Quakebot. Apparently a bunch of machines write the news, not just Quakebot, Forbes magazine uses a company called Narrative Science to robotically report corporate earnings. Narrative Science also created ProPublica to write summaries of 52,000 schools in a database. Other bots write homicide reports and still others write sports articles. Real live reporters need not worry about being replaced...yet. So far robots are used mainly for boring data aggregating stories because when it comes to crunching numbers and using pure computer power these robots can’t be beat. Automated Insights builds robot reporters that look for interesting trends and in 2013 they churned out 300 million pieces. Sound mind boggling? It does to me too, but I still write this blog!