5d ago

China’s Next-Gen TV Anchors Hustle for Jobs AI Already Does: The rise of AI in broadcasting is pushing China’s top journalism schools to rethink what skills still set human anchors apart.

www.sixthtone.com China’s Next-Gen TV Anchors Hustle for a Job AI Is Already Doing

The growing use of AI in television broadcasting is forcing China’s top journalism schools to reconsider what skills still set human anchors apart.

Technology @programming.dev

www.sixthtone.com /news/1017300

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Having artificially generated news anchors seems so bizarre to me.
It's one person that in a country like china will be seen by tens or hundreds of millions of people. Is it really worth it to axe that job and put some uncanny valley CGI figure in their place? The per viewer cost saving must be fractions of a penny, and it risks putting off a not insignificant amount of people.
Now, if initiatives like this can be used for things like generating a figure that can do sign language in the corner of a screen that would be an amazing development, but this? I just don't see it.
I even get it for broadcasting to a very small audience, such as languages with almost no speakers. E.g. having an always-available Welsh language presenter. But this? Nah.
- It's about control.
- With the constant stream of news I would suppose it's handy to have some virtual anchor available 24/24 and that you can start in a matter of minutes.
  It's cynical of course but I kind of get the idea.
  
  The AI anchor will never die, grow old, or grow a conscience. It can remain the perfect propaganda operative, A/B test in real time, etc, forever.
- The per viewer cost saving must be fractions of a penny.
  Why wouldn't you save a fraction of a penny if you could? Out of compassion for a fellow human? That's insane.
- I love this reasoning. Perfectly agree. Must be so unnecessary for large stations. Although I guess this does open up for smaller broadcasters to open news rooms.
  But yeah, it would sure put me off. I wasn't to see a human speaking to me.
- The per viewer cost saving must be fractions of a penny.
  For a national television, sure. For the hundreds of thousands of small influencers seeing this free advertisement on TV, it would be a major cost saving.
  Imagine all the ladies from the tiktok mills not having to make funny faces on camera for hours at a time anymore.

13 comments