Guardian staff ‘deeply disturbed’ over AI use during strike
The move has unsettled employees because they claim that they were told that it would only be deployed following consultation and with readers fully informed
Staff at The Guardian have been left “deeply disturbed” by bosses’ decision to use artificial intelligence during walkouts over the sale of The Observer.
Katharine Viner, the editor of The Guardian, and Anna Bateson, Guardian Media Group’s chief executive, have been accused of “hypocrisy” by journalists who claim that the technology was used to help write headlines on four days in December.
The decision was said to have been made as staff protested outside its London offices about the controversial acquisition of the Sunday newspaper by the news start-up Tortoise Media.
“There were some very weird headlines during the four days. Some of them looked like the sort of thing that you would see in a TV drama when they try to mock up a newspaper front page,” said one journalist.
AI is increasingly being used as a tool to support journalists at many publishing companies, including News UK, the owner of The Times, but The Guardian’s move has unsettled staff because they claim that they were told that it would only be deployed following consultation and with readers fully informed.