As it turns out, humans have been creating slop too, longer than AI has. It's either 'cheap' masquerading as 'journalism' or it is 'entertainment' masquerading as journalism. But journalism. it is not.
Agree with the basic premise. But I don’t think most journalists are involved in some sort of anti-democratic, wealth aggregation scheme. A more simple explanation is that “CEO says a cool thing!” is likely to get more clicks than “CEO says a cool thing, but it probably won’t happen”. It can also be churned out more quickly, which is a necessity given more and more compressed news cycles.
Agreed 100%. It’s the economic model and incentives for online content. It’s expensive to research and interview people and gather evidence to support a viewpoint. It takes little time or effort to post an opinion or other things like ‘ceo said’. Plus outlandish or inflammatory content get the most clicks anyway, rather than measured and carefully researched journalism.
There is a lot of FUD and unsubstantiated hype around AI precisely because of this dynamic, as Gary has been carefully pointing out here for some time.
It is also "access journalism". The same problem some financial analysts get themselves into to get access to CEOs and CFOs. They cannot provide the context otherwise; they will lose their coveted access.
Whatever happened to journalists with contacts and rolodexes? In the bad old days of actual writers, journalists would have already developed contacts with experts in their field.
At the risk of being snide I point out the resemblance between “CEO fluffing” and the “.psychics’” predictions on the front pages of the tabloids on the checkout counters of supermarkets.
"sort of alternative reality journalistic simulacrum that kind of looks like journalism, but genuinely isn't interested in any context or truth that upsets the apple cart."
Like the courtiers flattering the monarch/dictator/(other top leader who can grant boons). If only POTUS's future would be analogous to that of Louis XVI's/Napoleon's.
I am always surprised when people complain that the media is biased to the left or the right.
the media is biased towards power. because power is where the information is. and they'll do anything to fluff up that power - to get any information they can get.
That means that it's biased to the right. Remember that "right wing" referred to the part of the French legislature made up of aristocrats. The right is fundamentally associated with the accumulation and use of power.
Eh, that seems facile. If that's the case, we could never talk about any left-wing movement having political power. We'd be forced to conclude that all left-wing movements either lacked any actual power, or became tautologically right-wing as soon as they acquired it (I know some leftists who would argue "predictably and incidentally" in various historical cases, but not "tautologically"). Taking this a step further, in the most democratic and equitable society that you can possible imagine, "the people would have the real power" (however you might imagine that). Journalism would logically then incline to what "the people" wanted...and we would still have to conclude that this was a right-wing bias!
It's not just "CEO" it's anyone with a strong opinion and a lot of followers ... it's just modern poor journalism - no context, no depth, no counterfactuals, no critical analysis... Just "this is what he/she said".
It's insulting to even call it "journalism." They are only defining different versions of glorified press releases aka propaganda hiding under Orwellian titles and word games.
The most unbearable (for me) is musk. musk said this ! musk said that ! the stupider, the merrier. but always - an intend. And nobody talks about the intend (or tries to figure it out). But of course, nothing being said is sincere. it's always a message .. to someone. And / or an obfuscation. I would actually love to see him in court. With people asking real questions, and no escape route.
This is exactly what Babel did to tech journalism in 2023: auto-generate 50 'AI is going to change everything' thinkpieces per week, post them everywhere, and watch the click revenue roll in. The human writers couldn't keep up, not because they weren't fast enough, but because they couldn't stomach the fraud. The real cost isn't just bad takes—it's that actual analysis gets drowned out by volume-driven nonsense. I'd link to a thread on this but the site's down for maintenance.
One thought, though. It is easy to rag on the “CEO said a thing” journalists, but I believe this particular phenomenon can remind us of several things special about this moment:
*CEOs increasingly both benefit from and enjoy attention and are willing to be rather outlandish and outspoken to get it
*mega wealthy CEOs like Musk and Bezos are accorded outsized credibility and influence simply because of their wealth, in what is frankly idolatry of the wealthy
* I don’t think we have ever had a US administration more willing to fork over gobs of money to businesses that they like, and who are so easily manipulated and exploited by people like Elon Musk
* social media gives the powerful a megaphone to broadcast their messages not only into normal media outlets, but into our phones and computers as well.
* if you are talking about tech CEOs, whose companies have an outsized potential to impact all of our future work lives, and whose value makes up roughly 40% of our 401(k) – – well, that is almost by definition “newsworthy“, in that the public is simply dying to read it.
The special factors simply piggyback on the existing dynamic of the news media, in which lazy or time starved reporters simply polish up press releases from corporate America and present them as news. But the special character and frequency of the idiocy point back to some of the unique factors of our moment in history.
Brilliant.
As it turns out, humans have been creating slop too, longer than AI has. It's either 'cheap' masquerading as 'journalism' or it is 'entertainment' masquerading as journalism. But journalism. it is not.
Difference is, now they don't even have to write it, just "prompt" it.
Agree with the basic premise. But I don’t think most journalists are involved in some sort of anti-democratic, wealth aggregation scheme. A more simple explanation is that “CEO says a cool thing!” is likely to get more clicks than “CEO says a cool thing, but it probably won’t happen”. It can also be churned out more quickly, which is a necessity given more and more compressed news cycles.
Agreed 100%. It’s the economic model and incentives for online content. It’s expensive to research and interview people and gather evidence to support a viewpoint. It takes little time or effort to post an opinion or other things like ‘ceo said’. Plus outlandish or inflammatory content get the most clicks anyway, rather than measured and carefully researched journalism.
There is a lot of FUD and unsubstantiated hype around AI precisely because of this dynamic, as Gary has been carefully pointing out here for some time.
It is also "access journalism". The same problem some financial analysts get themselves into to get access to CEOs and CFOs. They cannot provide the context otherwise; they will lose their coveted access.
That is precisely the point that Gary makes in bullet point number 3.
This is a naive view. News organizations are corporations with policies that reporters must follow, largely enforced by editors.
Whatever happened to journalists with contacts and rolodexes? In the bad old days of actual writers, journalists would have already developed contacts with experts in their field.
Many of todays “journalists” have rolloverdexes .
They roll over and expose their underbelly to the alpha wolf
💯 -- its engagement farming all the way down.
At the risk of being snide I point out the resemblance between “CEO fluffing” and the “.psychics’” predictions on the front pages of the tabloids on the checkout counters of supermarkets.
Then there is good journalism: The Marcus interview today on public radio was high quality and engaging.
Think hard readers, are you a stenographer or a journalist?
A stAInographer is a stenographer for AI CEOs
"sort of alternative reality journalistic simulacrum that kind of looks like journalism, but genuinely isn't interested in any context or truth that upsets the apple cart."
Interesting parallel to GPTs, that.
Love this article!
This ESPECIALLY applies to ALL of the AI CEOs.
I pay zero attention to what Altman, Amodei and Jensen Huang say.
The other and much worse example is: "President said a thing". And this is REALLY bad with Trump, who seemingly can not utter one single true word.
And his cabinet.
This ass kissing behavior is like have been copied from the behavior of the comunism that I knew in my youth back to the times of Cheausescu.
In fact I think the communists had a resemblance of common sense compared to this situation here and now in a dog eats dog world of capitalism.
What does this mean is that the problem is all human an common to any society.
The "backbone" problem.
Like the courtiers flattering the monarch/dictator/(other top leader who can grant boons). If only POTUS's future would be analogous to that of Louis XVI's/Napoleon's.
I am always surprised when people complain that the media is biased to the left or the right.
the media is biased towards power. because power is where the information is. and they'll do anything to fluff up that power - to get any information they can get.
even if its disinformation....
That means that it's biased to the right. Remember that "right wing" referred to the part of the French legislature made up of aristocrats. The right is fundamentally associated with the accumulation and use of power.
Eh, that seems facile. If that's the case, we could never talk about any left-wing movement having political power. We'd be forced to conclude that all left-wing movements either lacked any actual power, or became tautologically right-wing as soon as they acquired it (I know some leftists who would argue "predictably and incidentally" in various historical cases, but not "tautologically"). Taking this a step further, in the most democratic and equitable society that you can possible imagine, "the people would have the real power" (however you might imagine that). Journalism would logically then incline to what "the people" wanted...and we would still have to conclude that this was a right-wing bias!
It's not just "CEO" it's anyone with a strong opinion and a lot of followers ... it's just modern poor journalism - no context, no depth, no counterfactuals, no critical analysis... Just "this is what he/she said".
It's insulting to even call it "journalism." They are only defining different versions of glorified press releases aka propaganda hiding under Orwellian titles and word games.
The most unbearable (for me) is musk. musk said this ! musk said that ! the stupider, the merrier. but always - an intend. And nobody talks about the intend (or tries to figure it out). But of course, nothing being said is sincere. it's always a message .. to someone. And / or an obfuscation. I would actually love to see him in court. With people asking real questions, and no escape route.
This is exactly what Babel did to tech journalism in 2023: auto-generate 50 'AI is going to change everything' thinkpieces per week, post them everywhere, and watch the click revenue roll in. The human writers couldn't keep up, not because they weren't fast enough, but because they couldn't stomach the fraud. The real cost isn't just bad takes—it's that actual analysis gets drowned out by volume-driven nonsense. I'd link to a thread on this but the site's down for maintenance.
Thanks Gary – – what a wonderfully written piece!
One thought, though. It is easy to rag on the “CEO said a thing” journalists, but I believe this particular phenomenon can remind us of several things special about this moment:
*CEOs increasingly both benefit from and enjoy attention and are willing to be rather outlandish and outspoken to get it
*mega wealthy CEOs like Musk and Bezos are accorded outsized credibility and influence simply because of their wealth, in what is frankly idolatry of the wealthy
* I don’t think we have ever had a US administration more willing to fork over gobs of money to businesses that they like, and who are so easily manipulated and exploited by people like Elon Musk
* social media gives the powerful a megaphone to broadcast their messages not only into normal media outlets, but into our phones and computers as well.
* if you are talking about tech CEOs, whose companies have an outsized potential to impact all of our future work lives, and whose value makes up roughly 40% of our 401(k) – – well, that is almost by definition “newsworthy“, in that the public is simply dying to read it.
The special factors simply piggyback on the existing dynamic of the news media, in which lazy or time starved reporters simply polish up press releases from corporate America and present them as news. But the special character and frequency of the idiocy point back to some of the unique factors of our moment in history.