In 2018, you will be scooped by a reporter using artificial intelligence.
Four years ago, ProPublica’s Scott Klein predicted “you will be scooped by a reporter who knows how to program.” And you were.
In the months ahead, some of those journo-programmers — and probably some grad students looking for strong, unique projects — will break big stories using machine learning. These will be important truths and facts invisible to humans alone.
I’m not talking about computer-generated stories about earthquakes, earnings reports, or sports scores. These will be stories on your beat, written by humans who understand how to use machine learning to aid their reporting.
It’s already happening:
Over the past year, conversations around AI and journalism often ventured into worries about artificial intelligence being deployed to replace reporters. But in the new year, we’ll be talking about how often reporters deployed artificial intelligence to land big stories.
John Keefe is a developer in the Quartz Bot Studio.
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Jennifer Coogan The future is female
Rachel Davis Mersey AI, with real smarts
Matt DeRienzo A recession, then a collapse
Corey Johnson The pro-fact resistance
Mi-Ai Parrish Blockchain and trust
Doris Truong Computer vision vs. the Internet vigilantes
Edward Roussel Eyes, ears, and brains
Raney Aronson-Rath Transparency is the antidote to fake news
Eric Ulken The year local publishers get smart(er) about change
Mariano Blejman News games rule
Claire Wardle Disinformation gets worse
Rubina Madan Fillion Unlocking the potential of AI
Michelle Garcia Navigating journalistic transparency
Federica Cherubini The rise of bridge roles in news organizations
Juleyka Lantigua Women of color will reclaim and monetize our time
Monika Bauerlein The firehose of falsehood
Renée Kaplan The year of quiet adjustments (shhh)
Jacqui Cheng Retailers move into content
Craig Newmark Working together toward sustainable solutions
Julia B. Chan Looking for loyalty in all the right places
Adam Thomas Sharing is caring: The year of the mentor
Sydette Harry Listen to your corner and watch for the hook
Joyce Barnathan It will be harder to bury the news
An Xiao Mina Memes and visuals come to the fore
Sarah Marshall Loyalty as the key performance indicator
Mariana Moura Santos Think local, act global
Amy King Let’s amplify visual voice
Carlos Martínez de la Serna The new journalism commons
Mary Meehan Real lives are at stake in rural areas
Emily Goligoski Looking beyond news for inspiration
Imaeyen Ibanga Longform video leads the way
Juliette De Maeyer A responsible press criticism
Niketa Patel Live journalism comes of age
Rick Berke Value is the watchword
Tim Carmody Watch out for Spotify
Carrie Brown-Smith Transparency finally takes off
Cristina Wilson The year of the Instagram Story
Pablo Boczkowski The rise of skeptical reading
Trushar Barot The Jio-fication of India
Molly de Aguiar Good journalism won’t be enough
Nikki Usher The year of The Washington Post
Richard Tofel The platforms’ power demands more reporters’ attention
Amie Ferris-Rotman More female reporters abroad (please)
David Skok Finding an information-life balance
Kristen Muller The year of the voter
Millie Tran and Stine Bauer Dahlberg (Hint: It’s about your brand)
Sam Ford The year of investing in processes
José Zamora Revenue-first journalism
Borja Echevarría TV goes digital, digital goes TV
Pete Brown Push alerts, personalized
Daniel Trielli The rich get richer, the poor scramble
Bill Keller A growing turn to philanthropy
Mike Caulfield Refactoring media literacy for the networked age
Rodney Benson Better, less read, and less trusted
Jared Newman Venture funding and digital news don’t mix
Tracie Powell The muting of underserved voices
Matt Carlson Attacks on the press will get worse
Cindy Royal Your journalism curriculum is obsolete
Tanya Cordrey Finally, the seeds of radical reinvention
C.W. Anderson The social media apocalypse
Betsy O'Donovan and Melody Kramer Skepticism and narcissism
Lanre Akinola Making noise is not a strategy
Rodney Gibbs Tech workers turn to journalism
Alan Soon The rise of start of psychographic, micro-targeted media
Andrew Ramsammy The year ownership mattered
Debra Adams Simmons And a woman shall lead them
Sara M. Watson Feeds will open up to new user-determined filters
Corey Ford The empire strikes back
Ray Soto VR reaches the next level
Ruth Palmer Risks will grow for news subjects — especially minorities
Marcela Donini and Thiago Herdy Collaboration is the way forward for Brazilian journalism
Gordon Crovitz Serving readers over advertisers
Umbreen Bhatti The trust problem isn’t new
Taylor Lorenz Social and media will split
Mandy Velez texting is lit rn, fam
Kinsey Wilson Facebook and Google: Help out or pay up
Vivian Schiller Pivot to tomorrow
Tamar Charney We get serious about algorithms
Nicholas Diakopoulos Fortifying social media from automated inauthenticity
Ståle Grut Reclaiming audience interaction from social networks
Caitlin Thompson Podcasting models mature and diversify
Charo Henríquez Training is an investment, not an expense
Damon Krukowski Reviving the alt-weekly soul
Justin Kosslyn The year journalists become digital security experts
Michael Kuntz The only pivot that might work
Nushin Rashidian Publishers seek ad dollar alternatives
Raju Narisetti Mirror, mirror on the wall
Brian Lam Sketchy ethics around product reviews
Dheerja Kaur Fun with subscription products
Steve Grove The midterms are an opportunity
Joanne McNeil Gatekeeping the gatekeepers
Julia Beizer A longer view on the pivot
S. Mitra Kalita The arc of news and audience
Monique Judge Letting black women tell their own stories
Christopher Meighan Passive partnership is in the rearview
Zizi Papacharissi Women come back
Jim Brady With the people, not just of the people
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen The Snapchat scenario and the risk of more closed platforms
Ernst-Jan Pfauth Publishing less to give readers more
Alfred Hermida Going beyond mobile-first
Kawandeep Virdee Zines had it right all along
Manoush Zomorodi Self-help as a publishing strategy
Jarrod Dicker Honesty in advertising
Amy Webb Listen to weak signals
Aron Pilhofer We can’t leave the business to the business side any more
Alice Antheaume Are you fluent in AI?
Matt Boggie The intellectual equivalent of the Dead Sea
Hossein Derakhshan Television has won
Tanzina Vega It’s time for media companies to #PassTheMic
Jamie Mottram From pageviews to t-shirts
Miguel Castro The arrival of the impact producer
Luke O'Neil The end is already here
P. Kim Bui The reckoning is only beginning
Joanne Lipman Journalists inventing revenue streams
Dannagal G. Young Stop covering politics as a game
Jessica Parker Gilbert Design connects storytelling and strategy
Michelle Ferrier The year of the great reckoning
Helen Havlak Keywords, not publishers, power the world’s biggest feeds
Kathleen McElroy Building a news video experience native to mobile
Cory Haik Suffering from realness, pivoting to impact
Andrew Haeg The year journalists become relationship builders
Errin Haines At the ballot, it’s time to count black women
Alexios Mantzarlis Moving fake news research out of the lab
Elizabeth Jensen Show your work
Sam Sanders Shine the light on ourselves
Alastair Coote The year of self-improvement
Lucas Graves From algorithms to institutions
Frédéric Filloux External forces
Felix Salmon Covering bitcoin while owning bitcoin
Heather Bryant Building the ecosystems for collaboration
Jennifer Brandel and Mónica Guzmán The editorial meeting of the future
Pia Frey Address users as individuals
Evie Nagy Pivot to mobile video frustration
Kim Fox Audience teams diversify their approach
Basile Simon We need better career paths for news nerds
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Seeking trust in fragmented spaces
Susie Banikarim R.I.P. Pivot to Video (2017–2017)
Matt Thompson Here come the attention managers
Jassim Ahmad Thriving on change
Mary Walter-Brown Show a little vulnerability
Rachel Schallom Better design helps differentiate opinion and news
Jim Moroney Newspapers have to be good enough for readers to pay for
Eric Nuzum Beyond the narrative arc
Dan Shanoff You down with OTT? (Yeah, DTC)
Mira Lowe The year of the local watchdog
Jennifer Choi Standing up for us and for each other
Sally Lehrman Trust comes first
Marie Gilot No assholes allowed
Vanessa K. DeLuca Women’s voices take center stage
Mario García Storytelling finally adapts to mobile
Feli Sánchez The year for guerrilla user research
Jesse Holcomb Information disorder, coming to a congressional district near you
Nicholas Quah Stop talking trash about young people
Kyle Ellis Let’s build our way out of this
Will Sommer The year local media gets conservative
Emma Carew Grovum Newsroom culture becomes a priority
Andrew Losowsky The year of resilience
Francesco Marconi The year of machine-to-machine journalism
Lam Thuy Vo Breaking free from the tyranny of the loudest
Laura E. Davis Writing answers before you know the question