Photo: RMG Interesting
On April 6, within the framework of the All-Russian Business Media Forum, traditionally organized by the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University, the session “Digital Media Industry: Challenges of Big Data and of artificial intelligence”, the participants of which discussed topical issues of the modern media environment. The event was attended by the general director of the Russian media group Dmitry Mednikov.
The moderator of the discussion, attended by current editors, media market experts, was the Dean of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University named after MV Lomonosov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Education, Professor EL Vartanova.
The media industry is changing. Today, all content, entertainment, information fit in a small smartphone. And this has a huge impact on the whole sector, on the editorial policy and the activities of the usual media.
One of the important topics discussed at the forum was artificial intelligence, the development of which took a giant leap last year. Andrey Zamkov, a researcher at the Department of Digital Journalism at the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University, noted that leading analysts predict a deep penetration of artificial intelligence in the field of communication and journalism. However, this process has a number of nuances, including the technical and financial difficulties of integrating AI into the media industry, as well as ethical aspects.
Dmitry Mednikov, Managing Director of Russian Media Group, discussed the questionable role of artificial intelligence in the development of the industry in his speech “Artificial intelligence and content production. New opportunities”.
The holding recently launched a unique online radio, entirely from concept to content, created by a neural network. This is the first experiment in the Russian radio industry that demonstrates the enormous potential of artificial intelligence. However, the algorithm still does not exist outside of human labor, since production is done by people.
“Producing products created by a neural network is a new profession that will work with AI in the future,” said Dmitry Mednikov. – Today we are faced with many questions regarding the role of artificial intelligence in the media. Is it profitable from a media business point of view? Yes. Can a significant amount of work for which a salary is paid be replaced by work with algorithms that create images, music, texts? Yes you can. From a business perspective, AI is interesting and useful.
At the same time, Dmitry Mednikov pointed out that even despite the development of neural networks and the improvement of the content they produce, “live” journalism will not die.
“There will be live reporting, creating life-based expression. And future journalists will talk about what is happening in the world, excite readers, and neural networks will not bother them. But we will inevitably create a new content factory using artificial intelligence. And it makes sense to discuss how those who develop the media industry in Russia in the future will get the most out of it,” said the general director of the Russian Media Group.
