WEBVTT 00:00:00.017 --> 00:00:05.177 Hello, and welcome to the edition podcast. I'm your host, Charlotte Henry, 00:00:05.577 --> 00:00:08.757 and I'm joined this week by my very good friend, 00:00:09.337 --> 00:00:16.577 teacher, academic, author, writer of One Man and His Blog, Adam Timworth. Hello, Adam. 00:00:16.937 --> 00:00:22.397 Hello, Charles. How are you? I'm good. Did I miss out anything from the introduction? Not something. 00:00:23.197 --> 00:00:26.117 I think that'll do for now. very good right 00:00:26.117 --> 00:00:28.957 yes check out one man and his blog.com if only because the 00:00:28.957 --> 00:00:32.757 name keeps us in a certain distinct part 00:00:32.757 --> 00:00:36.397 of british television history which i 00:00:36.397 --> 00:00:39.357 suspect one of my listeners will recognize now 00:00:39.357 --> 00:00:42.217 forgive me for saying it was a joke that i thought was funny 00:00:42.217 --> 00:00:45.217 20 years ago but when you have to try and explore explain 00:00:45.217 --> 00:00:48.017 to a bunch of singaporean journalists what one 00:00:48.017 --> 00:00:51.637 man and his dog was and they look at you like the british 00:00:51.637 --> 00:00:58.197 are clearly mad which is not an unreasonable conclusion to come to that's fair 00:00:58.197 --> 00:01:03.377 and i've forgotten actually one man is blog one man is dog still recurs once 00:01:03.377 --> 00:01:08.917 a year um on a country file does it yes they still do it periodically, 00:01:09.617 --> 00:01:16.357 We've thoroughly, thoroughly confused my American listeners now. So welcome. 00:01:17.697 --> 00:01:21.557 Luckily, we're going to talk on something a bit more modern, which is AI. 00:01:22.607 --> 00:01:26.427 Obviously, because there's so much discussion in the journalism space about AI. 00:01:27.227 --> 00:01:32.207 But you have saved us all, because there are a lot of journalists that are worried 00:01:32.207 --> 00:01:37.327 about the consequences of AI in a newsroom, in the wider media environment. 00:01:37.687 --> 00:01:41.907 But you've come up with a manifesto, and you humbly called it Report and Connect, 00:01:42.107 --> 00:01:47.607 a manifesto for the survival of journalism in the AI age. It's a fascinating read. 00:01:48.987 --> 00:01:51.067 So go on then, how are you going to save us all? 00:01:52.647 --> 00:01:58.047 No, I'm not going to say where it would be. But if people think about what journalism 00:01:58.047 --> 00:02:01.467 actually is, rather than what they sometimes perceive it as being, 00:02:01.867 --> 00:02:03.167 then we've got an opportunity. 00:02:03.487 --> 00:02:11.587 I suppose the root of this is a long held theory about what journalism is or 00:02:11.587 --> 00:02:16.927 should be, which is existing in service of a community. 00:02:17.407 --> 00:02:22.467 So you know journalism is not an abstract art um it's 00:02:22.467 --> 00:02:25.327 not the sort of thing that you can be a journalist and starve in 00:02:25.327 --> 00:02:28.307 a garret and then people find your journalism in 50 years 00:02:28.307 --> 00:02:31.687 and then suddenly you become a celebrated journalist it's something 00:02:31.687 --> 00:02:34.687 performed in real time for an audience well yeah people starve in garrets 00:02:34.687 --> 00:02:37.647 but they rarely but their journalism rarely gets discovered 00:02:37.647 --> 00:02:40.887 50 years later because it's all that's true and that's 00:02:40.887 --> 00:02:44.007 the core problem unlike the sort of the the abstract thing of 00:02:44.007 --> 00:02:48.347 art journalism is a service performed for an audience and 00:02:48.347 --> 00:02:53.087 at some level we've managed to or at least sections of the industry have sort 00:02:53.087 --> 00:02:58.947 of abstracted that thought away and i had a conversation with um johanna geary 00:02:58.947 --> 00:03:03.787 exit twitter now bloomberg years ago about this sort of abstract gods of journalism 00:03:03.787 --> 00:03:05.627 which some of us are trying to serve by that. 00:03:06.295 --> 00:03:09.015 The idea that's a sort of like there is the 00:03:09.015 --> 00:03:12.175 perfect story there is a brilliant story and 00:03:12.175 --> 00:03:15.135 that appeases the gods of journalism even if 00:03:15.135 --> 00:03:17.875 nobody reads it um and you 00:03:17.875 --> 00:03:20.535 know that's the sort of like nobody read the story but it was 00:03:20.535 --> 00:03:23.655 a great story well clearly it wasn't or it 00:03:23.655 --> 00:03:26.315 was but you didn't sell it in the right 00:03:26.315 --> 00:03:29.275 way or put it in front of the audience in the right way that made them care about 00:03:29.275 --> 00:03:32.435 it so you know a story only matters 00:03:32.435 --> 00:03:36.255 if it has an impact on an audience fundamentally and 00:03:36.255 --> 00:03:39.275 this this is this is the core of journalism it isn't something that 00:03:39.275 --> 00:03:42.895 exists in isolation to me at least yeah 00:03:42.895 --> 00:03:45.815 i broadly agree with that i think you can still write an excellent 00:03:45.815 --> 00:03:51.335 story and it not get the publicity or public recognition you as the journalist 00:03:51.335 --> 00:03:54.955 thinks it deserves i mean let's be honest we've all done those stories yes absolutely 00:03:54.955 --> 00:04:00.195 and sometimes sometimes you're right and that it is a great story it's just 00:04:00.195 --> 00:04:04.095 that you didn't sell it in the right way you didn't put and social at the right time, 00:04:04.375 --> 00:04:06.455 or just sometimes the rolls of the dice. 00:04:06.655 --> 00:04:11.095 I mean, there's anybody who's done any level of origins work knows that sometimes 00:04:11.095 --> 00:04:14.395 everything should be right, it should work, and it just doesn't, 00:04:14.475 --> 00:04:16.415 and that's just sometimes just bad luck. 00:04:16.915 --> 00:04:21.155 Exactly. That's kind of what I'm getting at. But as an overall principle. 00:04:21.895 --> 00:04:25.475 You know, journalism that doesn't have an impact on somebody is not really journalism. 00:04:25.475 --> 00:04:27.535 It's not really useful. It's just... 00:04:28.075 --> 00:04:30.935 Yeah, and it certainly has to operate in the moment. 00:04:31.055 --> 00:04:33.955 That's by definition what it is, you know. we all like to tell ourselves we're 00:04:33.955 --> 00:04:37.075 writing the first draft of history etc etc and so 00:04:37.075 --> 00:04:40.255 it does absolutely have to exist in the moment yeah it's 00:04:40.255 --> 00:04:43.395 relevant in the moment yeah irrelevant in the moment um 00:04:43.395 --> 00:04:46.435 even if it's something that's about events that 00:04:46.435 --> 00:04:49.375 happened in the past so i was thinking about that that big 00:04:49.375 --> 00:04:56.595 observer exclusive about the salt path um that was what their first big um notable 00:04:56.595 --> 00:05:02.875 hit under the tortoise ownership right yeah yeah yeah um and where does ai fit 00:05:02.875 --> 00:05:07.995 into all of this and that which is obviously what prompted you to write your manifesto um. 00:05:09.041 --> 00:05:15.741 AI fits into this because, obviously, we have this technology that is likely 00:05:15.741 --> 00:05:20.861 to be transformative in the way you consume and use information. 00:05:21.661 --> 00:05:27.521 And produce information. Yes, absolutely. So, to me, it feels a bit like we 00:05:27.521 --> 00:05:31.141 did back in sort of 1997, 1998-ish. 00:05:31.481 --> 00:05:36.701 When we were in that sort of first wave, the internet was clearly going to be a big thing. 00:05:36.701 --> 00:05:39.401 But nobody quite knew what the 00:05:39.401 --> 00:05:42.621 impact of it was going to be and to the 00:05:42.621 --> 00:05:45.561 point that i suspect and there's been quite a lot of reporting lately 00:05:45.561 --> 00:05:48.601 about the fact that we may be in something of an economic bubble around ai 00:05:48.601 --> 00:05:51.741 right now um the companies are 00:05:51.741 --> 00:05:55.401 too valued everyone's getting a bit excited about our crypto 00:05:55.401 --> 00:05:58.401 moment also a vast amount of the investment is 00:05:58.401 --> 00:06:01.121 going into a limited number of companies a vast amount 00:06:01.121 --> 00:06:04.101 of overall economic investment in america and 00:06:04.101 --> 00:06:07.061 other places is going into ai and is 00:06:07.061 --> 00:06:10.601 likely to cause an economic crash if those 00:06:10.601 --> 00:06:13.741 companies struggle but that's off to the side but 00:06:13.741 --> 00:06:17.001 it feels like we're in that sort of a moment uh similar to 00:06:17.001 --> 00:06:22.221 the dot-com boom um 30 years ago nearly where um everything's going to happen 00:06:22.221 --> 00:06:25.161 we know it's going to be big nobody quite knows how it's going to be big yet 00:06:25.161 --> 00:06:29.341 everybody's trying there will probably be a retreat from some of the things 00:06:29.341 --> 00:06:33.981 we're doing right now but overall there is a sea change coming, 00:06:34.641 --> 00:06:39.821 and particularly if you talk to young people they are so. 00:06:41.821 --> 00:06:47.281 A usage of AI is so established it's not going to go away anytime soon but they're 00:06:47.281 --> 00:06:48.921 trying to navigate what it actually does. 00:06:50.974 --> 00:06:56.914 Is that true? Are people, and I don't mean this as a sort of Luddite, 00:06:57.014 --> 00:07:01.594 naive question, but are young people, and what do you mean by, 00:07:01.654 --> 00:07:03.894 first of all, do you mean students? Do you mean 12-year-olds? 00:07:04.494 --> 00:07:09.594 Are people like, so I know I use chat GPT sometimes when I want an answer to a question. 00:07:09.774 --> 00:07:12.674 I have to tell you, often the answer to the question is wrong. 00:07:12.874 --> 00:07:14.214 Well, this is the challenge. 00:07:14.574 --> 00:07:17.894 So two anecdotes, acknowledging the anecdotes is not data. 00:07:17.894 --> 00:07:22.554 First of which is my year two undergraduates last year so we're talking about 00:07:22.554 --> 00:07:28.634 22 year olds no you're probably talking 19 19 19 20 year olds some of them a 00:07:28.634 --> 00:07:32.374 bit older if you get some mature students but yeah we're talking late teens 00:07:32.374 --> 00:07:35.954 early 20s the very most and so i actually asked the class um. 00:07:36.931 --> 00:07:40.191 How many of them used a google ai overviews 00:07:40.191 --> 00:07:43.111 regularly right and i would say and remember this is not a normal 00:07:43.111 --> 00:07:45.771 class in the nicest possible sense this is a class full of 00:07:45.771 --> 00:07:48.651 journalism students um who have clawed their 00:07:48.651 --> 00:07:52.011 way onto a journalism course but i would say 60 00:07:52.011 --> 00:07:55.231 didn't 60 scrolled straight to 00:07:55.231 --> 00:07:58.871 the other results 40 did but 00:07:58.871 --> 00:08:01.991 the ones the 40 did who use them regularly admitted it 00:08:01.991 --> 00:08:05.291 this um led to a vigorous exchange 00:08:05.291 --> 00:08:07.971 of views between the two groups where i was able to sort 00:08:07.971 --> 00:08:11.211 of sit back with a metaphorical box of popcorn and enjoy this 00:08:11.211 --> 00:08:14.091 for five minutes before stepping in and reasserting control over 00:08:14.091 --> 00:08:17.731 the class so yeah they're using it um in 00:08:17.731 --> 00:08:20.551 equally my daughters who are 10 and 00:08:20.551 --> 00:08:23.831 13 will routinely check the overviews 00:08:23.831 --> 00:08:26.971 but they have learned to be skeptical um i 00:08:26.971 --> 00:08:30.171 think um we recently watched the hobbit movies 00:08:30.171 --> 00:08:33.431 with them um and um one 00:08:33.431 --> 00:08:36.031 of them looked up you know before we got to the 00:08:36.031 --> 00:08:39.091 end of the movies what happened to feely and thundry or 00:08:39.091 --> 00:08:42.191 whatever name is the female elf they added um and 00:08:42.191 --> 00:08:47.051 when she discovered that ai overview suggested they retired together to barbados 00:08:47.051 --> 00:08:50.591 she came to the conclusion this probably wasn't true and they've now gone into 00:08:50.591 --> 00:08:55.331 a competition about finding the most ridiculous use of ai overviews they can 00:08:55.331 --> 00:09:00.891 oh most ridiculously inaccurate thing so yeah they are clearly using it but they are also. 00:09:01.531 --> 00:09:05.651 To some degree a little bit more skeptical about them than maybe older people 00:09:05.651 --> 00:09:10.391 are which is encouraging they older people are more you hear sort of times of 00:09:10.391 --> 00:09:14.031 people planning their holiday trips and find and trying to find their way to 00:09:14.031 --> 00:09:18.991 a valley in the Chilean mountains that doesn't exist yeah those sorts of problems, 00:09:19.989 --> 00:09:24.709 Yeah, I mean, forgive me, but I think those people sort of bring that on themselves. 00:09:26.929 --> 00:09:28.929 Not disagreeing. No, no, I'm 00:09:28.929 --> 00:09:33.809 not an AI. I say this every time I discuss this. I am not an AI-ledite. 00:09:34.149 --> 00:09:38.589 There are huge numbers of things it's going to have an impact on, particularly, 00:09:38.929 --> 00:09:41.789 I know people obviously talk about generative AI as well, 00:09:41.869 --> 00:09:45.669 where it starts taking on human-like 00:09:45.669 --> 00:09:48.849 qualities of intelligence and teaching itself 00:09:48.849 --> 00:09:51.809 and so on and so forth so i agree 00:09:51.809 --> 00:09:54.849 with your premise that this is a key moment in technology in 00:09:54.849 --> 00:09:58.049 the same way the dot-com boom was etc etc etc i 00:09:58.049 --> 00:10:01.809 don't think this is sort of crypto 2.0 where 00:10:01.809 --> 00:10:08.689 or the metaverse or the meta yeah metaverse is a great um example of that absolutely 00:10:08.689 --> 00:10:14.009 i don't think we're in that realm like this is serious game-changing stuff and 00:10:14.009 --> 00:10:20.569 it goes beyond google ai overviews or my silly searches on chat gpt it absolutely does. 00:10:21.429 --> 00:10:24.109 Um but equally i think we 00:10:24.109 --> 00:10:27.169 need to take a step back as well about kind 00:10:27.169 --> 00:10:29.889 of for one thing i always say i think 00:10:29.889 --> 00:10:32.869 people are going to take on and give more credence to 00:10:32.869 --> 00:10:36.029 human and clearly human created work in an 00:10:36.029 --> 00:10:39.589 age of growing ai slop and i really very 00:10:39.589 --> 00:10:42.729 strongly feel that and say that and every time i have one of these discussions 00:10:42.729 --> 00:10:45.569 yeah i suppose that that's the core of 00:10:45.569 --> 00:10:49.169 it so whenever there is an era of 00:10:49.169 --> 00:10:52.009 mechanization at any level from the industrial 00:10:52.009 --> 00:10:55.069 revolution onwards at some point you start to 00:10:55.069 --> 00:11:00.429 question okay well when the machines can do this chunk of stuff what do then 00:11:00.429 --> 00:11:06.889 humans what is left for humans um and without getting too philosophical i think 00:11:06.889 --> 00:11:11.409 we have gone through a phase where early monday afternoon please get philosophical 00:11:11.409 --> 00:11:13.229 i possibly need more coffee um. 00:11:14.254 --> 00:11:19.014 We've gone through a phase where we've almost increasingly tried to make humans 00:11:19.014 --> 00:11:21.974 more like machines in the way we get them to work. 00:11:22.154 --> 00:11:29.274 And without being too rude, if you can think of online news publications that 00:11:29.274 --> 00:11:37.374 have turned many of the younger staff maybe into rewriting machines, write throughs. 00:11:37.574 --> 00:11:42.414 So do a write through of this story. I rip off the story from another publication on our site. 00:11:42.414 --> 00:11:46.174 Um that is not a long-term 00:11:46.174 --> 00:11:49.194 viable job because those sorts of things are 00:11:49.194 --> 00:11:52.134 a going to be better done by 00:11:52.134 --> 00:11:54.974 ais yeah and b actually the 00:11:54.974 --> 00:11:58.074 need for that is almost completely going to be taken away because 00:11:58.074 --> 00:12:00.994 if somebody just wants a quick summary of what's going on ai is 00:12:00.994 --> 00:12:04.054 going to provide that in some way beyond a google ai 00:12:04.054 --> 00:12:06.794 overview there's going to be more intelligent ways of doing that yeah yes and 00:12:06.794 --> 00:12:09.474 those and those ways are going to develop i think i think 00:12:09.474 --> 00:12:12.494 people i think there's a degree of panic 00:12:12.494 --> 00:12:15.334 among the tech companies they feel they have to get into 00:12:15.334 --> 00:12:20.414 this space and so ai is being thrust into jobs is not particularly good at like 00:12:20.414 --> 00:12:24.934 being an answer engine because generative ais are essentially very good guessing 00:12:24.934 --> 00:12:28.274 engines but like anytime you're guessing sometimes they get it dramatically 00:12:28.274 --> 00:12:31.834 wrong yeah and we're trying to thrust them into their answer role which is why 00:12:31.834 --> 00:12:34.234 i'm a little skeptical that we'll ever hit um. 00:12:35.545 --> 00:12:39.385 Total um well google 00:12:39.385 --> 00:12:42.365 zero and things like that yeah uh because i 00:12:42.365 --> 00:12:45.485 i think there will always be a role for searching for 00:12:45.485 --> 00:12:53.325 specific bits of information um but the core thing is as more more sort of simple 00:12:53.325 --> 00:12:59.845 information needs um are met through ai and increasing volumes of content out 00:12:59.845 --> 00:13:04.785 there are generated by AI of varying levels of trustworthiness, 00:13:05.445 --> 00:13:12.865 at some point, at least some people are going to have to seek something that's 00:13:12.865 --> 00:13:18.805 more trustworthy, something that they can understand the provenance of more clearly. 00:13:19.685 --> 00:13:23.645 And particularly, I cited in the piece you referred to, 00:13:24.105 --> 00:13:27.325 an acquaintance of mine david mattin who um is a 00:13:27.325 --> 00:13:30.005 sort of trend watcher and one of the 00:13:30.005 --> 00:13:33.365 things he he always uses as his frame for looking 00:13:33.365 --> 00:13:36.445 at what's what a new technology is going to do is the 00:13:36.445 --> 00:13:39.485 idea that humans fundamentally don't change 00:13:39.485 --> 00:13:42.785 even as technology does so as technology changes 00:13:42.785 --> 00:13:51.445 we just find at some level some of our behavior patterns are like that um and 00:13:51.445 --> 00:13:57.225 we still need social collections we are still social animals and their fundamental 00:13:57.225 --> 00:14:00.745 need for connection will remain important. 00:14:02.030 --> 00:14:06.250 Yes, I mean, you do say about we're fundamentally social creatures. 00:14:06.650 --> 00:14:09.390 Loneliness is associated with both mental and physical problems. 00:14:11.510 --> 00:14:16.210 Arguably, it's comparable to cigarette use and alcohol, abuse is a threat to your health, etc, etc. 00:14:16.430 --> 00:14:21.630 So we do want human connection and human interaction. We don't just want, 00:14:22.110 --> 00:14:28.390 well, we're not the people in Wally, are we, with the VR screens being whizzed around continually. 00:14:29.210 --> 00:14:32.790 And yeah a certain amount of stuff has moved 00:14:32.790 --> 00:14:35.750 online post-pandemic but equally a lot 00:14:35.750 --> 00:14:38.730 of things have gone back offline because people like 00:14:38.730 --> 00:14:41.870 being around other people and yeah i 00:14:41.870 --> 00:14:45.090 mean actually i think people have given far more credence to 00:14:45.090 --> 00:14:48.350 uh you know online in-person events 00:14:48.350 --> 00:14:51.530 because we realized how much we missed them yes absolutely when we 00:14:51.530 --> 00:14:54.470 were we were kept away from them for 18 months two 00:14:54.470 --> 00:14:58.950 years yeah it makes a lot of difference you make 00:14:58.950 --> 00:15:01.910 a really interesting point that i want to slightly debate with you which is 00:15:01.910 --> 00:15:08.010 news is not a fundamental human need you write is it useful yes does the societies 00:15:08.010 --> 00:15:12.310 function better with good unbiased reporting unquestionably yes but it's not 00:15:12.310 --> 00:15:16.070 a need it's a nice to have or possibly a very nice to have. 00:15:18.117 --> 00:15:21.777 Really? Well, a lot depends on how you define news. 00:15:22.477 --> 00:15:27.557 So, again, if you want to go back to the hunter-gatherer metaphor. 00:15:27.937 --> 00:15:32.037 So, news is, you know, dangerous animal is going to kill you over there. 00:15:33.357 --> 00:15:37.377 Food that you can eat is over there. And arguably, in that sense, 00:15:37.497 --> 00:15:38.917 news is a fundamental need. 00:15:39.217 --> 00:15:44.837 But it's a fundamental need that is supporting the really basic needs of humanity, 00:15:44.837 --> 00:15:47.917 which is social connection which is food which 00:15:47.917 --> 00:15:51.057 is shelter um and i 00:15:51.057 --> 00:15:54.597 feel like um this is what i'm trying to say news 00:15:54.597 --> 00:15:57.577 is not something we all crave and need and if 00:15:57.577 --> 00:16:00.497 you look at the news avoidance oh yeah 00:16:00.497 --> 00:16:03.737 right now that almost is clearly um yes 00:16:03.737 --> 00:16:06.797 i mean yes there are mental conditions where people avoid food but 00:16:06.797 --> 00:16:09.697 generally speaking we need food we have hunger we have these 00:16:09.697 --> 00:16:13.417 basic we have these basic human needs so 00:16:13.417 --> 00:16:17.317 it's it's essentially working out where news 00:16:17.317 --> 00:16:19.937 fits into these deeper human needs that's what 00:16:19.937 --> 00:16:25.097 i was trying to explore in that piece and i i think effectively news fits in 00:16:25.097 --> 00:16:29.017 a journalism the wider sense because it's not just about news um journals in 00:16:29.017 --> 00:16:33.857 the wider sense fits in by a helping communities function better but also be 00:16:33.857 --> 00:16:39.737 giving us information that allows us to function in these fundamental needs, if you like. 00:16:41.271 --> 00:16:47.271 And the impact of AI. I mean, I do think news is, I certainly think it is essential 00:16:47.271 --> 00:16:49.571 to functioning societies. 00:16:50.311 --> 00:17:01.291 I think we can all fairly easily point to examples of how the dilution of well-produced 00:17:01.291 --> 00:17:05.751 news in a sea of misinformation or opinion, 00:17:06.731 --> 00:17:11.491 has created problems within many societies where there is deep internet penetration. 00:17:12.551 --> 00:17:18.471 Yeah, exactly. And what's the role of AI in that discussion, 00:17:18.711 --> 00:17:22.871 in the sense of the essentialness of news, in the value of news? 00:17:23.031 --> 00:17:26.351 Well, it's not so much about the role of AI, it's the role of humans. 00:17:26.551 --> 00:17:31.571 So if we accept that in the same way that the arrival of the web, 00:17:32.511 --> 00:17:35.751 accelerated the amount of information available to us, the 00:17:35.751 --> 00:17:39.071 advent of generative ai is going to again 00:17:39.071 --> 00:17:42.311 further accelerate the overwhelming tide 00:17:42.311 --> 00:17:45.471 of information coming at us the role 00:17:45.471 --> 00:17:48.891 of this fundamental human is okay what is the core need that 00:17:48.891 --> 00:17:52.151 we as journalists are serving and therefore 00:17:52.151 --> 00:17:56.011 how can we express that in a way that is 00:17:56.011 --> 00:17:59.611 not going to be just replaced by ai right 00:17:59.611 --> 00:18:02.271 that's that's the fundamental thing so when we if we 00:18:02.271 --> 00:18:05.231 accept this technology is coming and we accept the 00:18:05.231 --> 00:18:08.671 most likely consequence of this which is just a tidal wave 00:18:08.671 --> 00:18:14.631 of ai slop with some ai value in there coming at most of us well we've already 00:18:14.631 --> 00:18:20.951 we're already getting that wave after wave after wave of slop content absolutely 00:18:20.951 --> 00:18:25.811 so in that in that context what what is left for us. 00:18:26.831 --> 00:18:31.151 And as, you know, human, where is the fact that we are human beings producing 00:18:31.151 --> 00:18:34.331 this rather than just fact checkers on our output? 00:18:34.671 --> 00:18:36.791 Where does the value come in that? 00:18:37.371 --> 00:18:39.091 And then you start thinking about getting out earlier. 00:18:39.851 --> 00:18:44.511 Yes, which is absolutely like human connection about making sure that sorry, 00:18:44.791 --> 00:18:46.991 if that was a noise, my light just fell over slightly. 00:18:48.831 --> 00:18:54.751 Apologies. So this is the point about sort of human connection and the sense of serving a community. 00:18:54.751 --> 00:19:01.831 And one of the things i find very interesting is if you look at sort of emergent media, 00:19:02.751 --> 00:19:07.951 i keep thinking i should write something about barry weiss and the free press 00:19:07.951 --> 00:19:12.031 and you know what's happened with that being purchased but i don't really care, 00:19:12.951 --> 00:19:17.511 well i don't the problem is i don't really care very much um in the sense that 00:19:17.511 --> 00:19:21.611 yes there is an independent media story there but she was somebody who had a 00:19:21.611 --> 00:19:23.831 high profile to start with in a big news organisation. 00:19:24.051 --> 00:19:26.551 She came out and has gone back into a big news organisation. 00:19:27.876 --> 00:19:31.456 Admittedly in a far more senior position and 00:19:31.456 --> 00:19:35.036 with far more power because of what she's done in the meantime what i'm 00:19:35.036 --> 00:19:38.236 really interested in is um well it's the 00:19:38.236 --> 00:19:41.376 sort of the current wave of emergent startup ones particularly where 00:19:41.376 --> 00:19:45.216 you know a bunch of maybe slightly less profile journalists go up and start 00:19:45.216 --> 00:19:50.016 something and start building it so 404 media would be a great example perhaps 00:19:50.016 --> 00:19:53.676 a very recent example would be the nerve the uh the five journalists from the 00:19:53.676 --> 00:19:57.756 observer um with glenn carol who've set up their own thing and they seem to 00:19:57.756 --> 00:20:00.316 be building subscribers at a fair old rate, 00:20:00.896 --> 00:20:03.616 um and one of the things that i found interesting about 00:20:03.616 --> 00:20:07.096 them is that one of the things you see them increasingly adding into 00:20:07.096 --> 00:20:12.896 the mix you get if you subscribe to 404 media for example is you get access 00:20:12.896 --> 00:20:18.936 to their members discord and access to a community of like-minded folks and 00:20:18.936 --> 00:20:22.516 i was having a conversation with somebody i was doing some training mentoring 00:20:22.516 --> 00:20:24.256 for recently one of the things as I said, 00:20:24.356 --> 00:20:28.136 one of the things we've discovered about sort of the public social media side 00:20:28.136 --> 00:20:32.036 of things is after a while, it's great fun going into the town forum. 00:20:32.276 --> 00:20:35.516 But then after a while, you get a bit bored where being in a space where people 00:20:35.516 --> 00:20:37.656 keep shouting at you for having different views of them. 00:20:38.036 --> 00:20:42.116 And occasionally you do want to retreat back to a space that's a more sort of 00:20:42.116 --> 00:20:44.776 friendly community. And that's very natural. 00:20:45.836 --> 00:20:49.636 And I think there's a really interesting little sliver of opportunity right 00:20:49.636 --> 00:20:55.096 now, in the sense that many of the big social media platforms are retreating 00:20:55.096 --> 00:20:58.936 from being social networks back to being social media. 00:20:59.906 --> 00:21:04.946 So if you look at something like Instagram, five, ten years ago, 00:21:05.126 --> 00:21:07.626 that would mainly be pictures from your friends and contacts. 00:21:08.166 --> 00:21:11.786 And now it's increasing. You're getting loads of stuff from influencers and 00:21:11.786 --> 00:21:14.526 celebs pushed at you by the algorithm. 00:21:14.746 --> 00:21:19.486 They're becoming more social media in the sense of media publishable by people 00:21:19.486 --> 00:21:23.566 rather than social networks, which are about supporting connections between people. 00:21:23.846 --> 00:21:27.026 If you look at Facebook's, sorry, Meta's products across the ground, 00:21:27.106 --> 00:21:29.626 they're all moving in that direction. 00:21:29.906 --> 00:21:36.106 So as the networks move away from being networks to being media again, 00:21:36.686 --> 00:21:43.526 is there a role for us to sort of sneak back in and pick up the work we were 00:21:43.526 --> 00:21:45.106 doing 20 years ago, which was 00:21:45.106 --> 00:21:50.406 starting to build communities around the information we were producing? 00:21:50.706 --> 00:21:52.906 Now, at the time, I was working in the business press. 00:21:54.286 --> 00:21:57.966 So I was working a B2B company, read information, as it was called, 00:21:57.966 --> 00:22:00.966 about read business publishing eventually then read business information 00:22:00.966 --> 00:22:04.486 and we were doing a lot of work building communities 00:22:04.486 --> 00:22:07.966 around our journalism um spectacularly 00:22:07.966 --> 00:22:11.246 well on things like farmers and social workers um and 00:22:11.246 --> 00:22:14.446 to various other industries which does really matter in the b2b press 00:22:14.446 --> 00:22:17.426 yes absolutely because the b2b press understood 00:22:17.426 --> 00:22:23.686 very from very has to understand to survive that the people they're writing 00:22:23.686 --> 00:22:27.646 for are the people they're writing about most of the time and they are yeah 00:22:27.646 --> 00:22:31.946 yeah and they are part of this sort of community of people they play a very 00:22:31.946 --> 00:22:35.986 important role in that community but they are deeply engaged with that community. 00:22:37.246 --> 00:22:40.146 Particularly one job i had so i was part 00:22:40.146 --> 00:22:43.966 of the focus team on estate's gazette the commercial property magazine that 00:22:43.966 --> 00:22:50.146 had a near-death experience um towards the end of last year um but my job was 00:22:50.146 --> 00:22:53.966 to literally travel around the country interviewing commercial property people 00:22:53.966 --> 00:22:59.146 in the different parts to the country and writing regional profiles of those things. 00:23:00.248 --> 00:23:03.628 And that was useful in itself because it brought in advertising revenue because 00:23:03.628 --> 00:23:05.228 people would advertise against these features. 00:23:05.908 --> 00:23:09.428 But I think one thing that I really appreciated at the time, 00:23:09.488 --> 00:23:15.588 but maybe the overall publishing team didn't, was how embedded this made Estates 00:23:15.588 --> 00:23:19.088 Gazette in the whole industry across the country. 00:23:19.348 --> 00:23:22.868 Because once a year, at least once a year, a journalist from Estates Gazette 00:23:22.868 --> 00:23:24.948 would turn up, they'd have interaction with them, they'd have a relationship 00:23:24.948 --> 00:23:27.448 with them. They'd get their focus in the magazine. 00:23:29.888 --> 00:23:33.228 Now, one particularly that struck in my mind as I was once sat in a boardroom 00:23:33.228 --> 00:23:34.868 waiting to interview the senior partner. 00:23:35.148 --> 00:23:38.748 And as I looked around the walls of the boardroom, I realised there was something 00:23:38.748 --> 00:23:42.368 like 70 or 80 years of the magazine I was writing for in bound volumes around 00:23:42.368 --> 00:23:46.228 the walls, which made me feel a sort of sense of connection with that industry. 00:23:46.588 --> 00:23:51.988 And my argument would be, AI, for all the good things it can, 00:23:52.468 --> 00:23:57.368 undoubtedly due to improve efficiency, to improve, you know, productivity... 00:23:58.961 --> 00:24:02.401 It can't rebuild that yeah 00:24:02.401 --> 00:24:05.201 and actually that to just 00:24:05.201 --> 00:24:08.001 continue with my argument from the states is that after i 00:24:08.001 --> 00:24:10.921 left um as things transitioned to digital they 00:24:10.921 --> 00:24:13.581 lost a lot of that um ad revenue in the 00:24:13.581 --> 00:24:16.921 magazine so they basically eventually over a few years completely 00:24:16.921 --> 00:24:19.821 unwound the section i used to work for didn't exist anymore 00:24:19.821 --> 00:24:22.761 and i think uh in the medium term 00:24:22.761 --> 00:24:25.581 they didn't realize well essentially they'd just given 80 percent of 00:24:25.581 --> 00:24:28.421 the country that didn't work in london a reason to stop buying 00:24:28.421 --> 00:24:31.561 the magazine and to stop subscribing to the website and 00:24:31.561 --> 00:24:34.541 they lost that sort of community connection because they were only seeing 00:24:34.541 --> 00:24:37.421 it as an ad get play of course and i think 00:24:37.421 --> 00:24:40.801 that at least some level led to the uh the near-death 00:24:40.801 --> 00:24:43.741 experience the magazine had towards the end of last year before mark allen 00:24:43.741 --> 00:24:47.981 group bought it and resurrected it and 00:24:47.981 --> 00:24:51.001 so i'm thinking about that about okay how 00:24:51.001 --> 00:24:54.821 can we not just participate in our 00:24:54.821 --> 00:24:57.941 communities but actually be a hub around which 00:24:57.941 --> 00:25:00.901 the community gathers um i sometimes talk about 00:25:00.901 --> 00:25:03.921 social object theory the idea that communities online will gather 00:25:03.921 --> 00:25:06.841 around a social object actually a great social object is 00:25:06.841 --> 00:25:09.601 news is journalism is information for that 00:25:09.601 --> 00:25:12.641 community and it doesn't matter whether that is 00:25:12.641 --> 00:25:15.321 the guardian and the social object is news for 00:25:15.321 --> 00:25:19.821 left-leaning people in the UK or it's 00:25:19.821 --> 00:25:23.041 um oh I don't know um white dwarf. 00:25:23.041 --> 00:25:29.201 Of information for people who like painting little fantasy and sci-fi figures. 00:25:29.201 --> 00:25:35.201 And waging war with them they're all communities yeah and we do like you know 00:25:35.201 --> 00:25:40.041 back to your original point about being part of human connection we do want to be part but then. 00:25:41.038 --> 00:25:45.598 Do you come back to conclude that AI is not going to have the impact we sort 00:25:45.598 --> 00:25:51.198 of think it might, because that human element is going to overbe, 00:25:51.238 --> 00:25:52.738 you know, withstand that? 00:25:54.238 --> 00:25:59.998 It scales here, because there are certain sorts of things that AI is going to be very good at. 00:26:01.638 --> 00:26:06.798 And it is going to be very good at processing, synthesizing information from lots of sources. 00:26:07.818 --> 00:26:10.618 But it's not going to do that with fundamental understanding. is going 00:26:10.618 --> 00:26:13.298 to do that on a probabilistic way and there 00:26:13.298 --> 00:26:16.878 are lots of places where that stuff is really useful it's 00:26:16.878 --> 00:26:19.698 not going to do this thing that the the hack who's been 00:26:19.698 --> 00:26:22.738 on the same desk for 25 years knows everyone in 00:26:22.738 --> 00:26:25.798 on the beat that they write about absolutely and who understands 00:26:25.798 --> 00:26:28.678 context and who understands history and 00:26:28.678 --> 00:26:31.838 can draw connections between these things um yeah 00:26:31.838 --> 00:26:35.378 but ai can help support some of these things uh 00:26:35.378 --> 00:26:38.338 but yeah i mean fundamentally i don't think 00:26:38.338 --> 00:26:42.058 ai i don't think there's any reason why ai 00:26:42.058 --> 00:26:45.418 will sweep away journalism but i 00:26:45.418 --> 00:26:48.458 do think the journalism needs to acknowledge the 00:26:48.458 --> 00:26:54.058 reality of what's coming and change to adapt and any point where you are taking 00:26:54.058 --> 00:26:58.878 a human being and make them behave like a machine is probably somewhere because 00:26:58.878 --> 00:27:02.938 the machine is going to be better at that than the human being is of course 00:27:02.938 --> 00:27:05.598 and so any point where you're doing that you have a problem. 00:27:06.595 --> 00:27:11.975 And fundamentally, what I see is that we've actually created a weakness for 00:27:11.975 --> 00:27:18.195 ourselves where we have in certain places pulled away from these community functions. 00:27:18.355 --> 00:27:21.935 I mean, local news would be a classic example where, you know, 00:27:22.055 --> 00:27:25.295 once upon a time, we'd have had people in the town you would actually meet. 00:27:25.535 --> 00:27:29.855 And these days they're sat in a content production hub in the latest, 00:27:30.075 --> 00:27:32.975 you know, in big town, which may be 40 or 50 miles away. 00:27:32.975 --> 00:27:36.975 Never actually seen in the town they're notionally writing about any sense of 00:27:36.975 --> 00:27:41.715 community connection is just gone and that's the sort of thing that's incredibly 00:27:41.715 --> 00:27:45.715 vulnerable to something just scraping all the online sources about a town and 00:27:45.715 --> 00:27:48.115 producing something automate in an automated way. 00:27:49.355 --> 00:27:52.235 Yeah i mean i i entirely agree with 00:27:52.235 --> 00:27:55.395 you on that and i think we're seeing in some 00:27:55.395 --> 00:27:58.135 ways the push back of that you know lots of 00:27:58.135 --> 00:28:01.195 newsletters i'm thinking emily sandberg's feed 00:28:01.195 --> 00:28:05.815 me and there's a few other things where so she's writing essentially about business 00:28:05.815 --> 00:28:11.475 in new york but it's got that very gossipy yes take people know she's walking 00:28:11.475 --> 00:28:16.175 and driving and eating and drinking in new york and talking to the people in 00:28:16.175 --> 00:28:20.895 the businesses she writes about and it's very human and gossipy and people like that. 00:28:21.737 --> 00:28:25.737 Ten years ago, when the Times moved over to their editions model, 00:28:25.957 --> 00:28:30.917 they did a whole bunch of research about what people really valued about the Times. 00:28:31.457 --> 00:28:35.157 And actually, one of the things that came out very strongly was it was the commentators, 00:28:35.477 --> 00:28:39.577 it was the known journalists, and the people were largely subscribing for that. 00:28:39.717 --> 00:28:44.297 Because I suppose the idea was the Times' readers were fairly busy people. 00:28:44.477 --> 00:28:47.657 They were not people who were going to be lurking on social media the whole 00:28:47.657 --> 00:28:50.857 time. They might see that a news story has gone by on social media, 00:28:50.857 --> 00:28:55.097 and then sort of mentally park it and say, I'll check out the Times' analysis. 00:28:55.537 --> 00:28:57.717 But they were like Danny Finkelstein's latest opinion piece. 00:28:57.717 --> 00:29:06.357 Absolutely. They trusted certain people to be the people who would explain it 00:29:06.357 --> 00:29:07.577 to them and contextualise it for them. 00:29:07.957 --> 00:29:11.997 So, you know, at that point, the most simple bits of news, that sort of breaking 00:29:11.997 --> 00:29:16.857 news, that thing that is happening, has been incredibly commoditised since Twitter came along. 00:29:17.077 --> 00:29:20.317 And any news story that can be captured back in the day, 00:29:20.317 --> 00:29:23.957 140 characters was immediately commoditized 00:29:23.957 --> 00:29:26.757 because it just spread to twitter like that yeah and so 00:29:26.757 --> 00:29:30.597 where becomes the value is where you add analysis context depth 00:29:30.597 --> 00:29:33.617 and there was a built a very important 00:29:33.617 --> 00:29:38.437 trust relationship there arguably that sort of independent newsletter economy 00:29:38.437 --> 00:29:42.757 which which you are part of and which we touch you on here is part of that you 00:29:42.757 --> 00:29:46.817 know you subscribe the newsletters who the people whose way of expressing themselves 00:29:46.817 --> 00:29:50.637 their thoughts and their personalities are most interesting to you. 00:29:51.427 --> 00:29:56.227 Right. And can AI sweep that away? I think it will struggle. 00:29:57.007 --> 00:30:03.027 Yes, I think it will struggle. AI will do various things, but there is that 00:30:03.027 --> 00:30:05.207 point of human connection to human connection. 00:30:05.907 --> 00:30:09.447 I sometimes, with my sort of training work, thinking about social media, 00:30:09.967 --> 00:30:15.127 use what I call the digital inverted pyramid, which is partially structured 00:30:15.127 --> 00:30:17.407 as an inverted pyramid to relax old journalists, 00:30:17.567 --> 00:30:20.687 to get very comfortable when you start talking about inverted pyramids, but 00:30:20.687 --> 00:30:24.427 also because it genuinely works and i sometimes think about social 00:30:24.427 --> 00:30:27.647 media as having three main components in journalism one of which is broadcast i 00:30:27.647 --> 00:30:31.007 read my stuff watch my stuff listen to my stuff um 00:30:31.007 --> 00:30:34.087 story finding i what marketing 00:30:34.087 --> 00:30:37.027 people will call social listening yeah thinking about 00:30:37.027 --> 00:30:40.287 social media as a big database of people talking about stuff finding 00:30:40.287 --> 00:30:43.167 the unanswered questions they've got finding the stories 00:30:43.167 --> 00:30:45.887 finding the user-generated content and verifying it to bring 00:30:45.887 --> 00:30:48.867 it into our stories yeah um but the third part 00:30:48.867 --> 00:30:51.687 is networking and that's the bottom of the inverted pyramid and 00:30:51.687 --> 00:30:55.727 the other two rest on them you know you build connections through 00:30:55.727 --> 00:31:00.407 social media you and i met first met through social media for example and those 00:31:00.407 --> 00:31:07.247 those networks develop over time it's in journalistic sense it's just a new 00:31:07.247 --> 00:31:12.847 way of working the beat um so yeah you go you're far enough back in time and 00:31:12.847 --> 00:31:15.347 you can only work the beat by walking and using your feet. 00:31:15.947 --> 00:31:17.887 And then you could write letters- Going into the right pub every year, 00:31:18.107 --> 00:31:22.027 yeah. Or then you could write letters, Dear sir, I hear tell that the following 00:31:22.027 --> 00:31:23.247 has occurred. Could you confirm? 00:31:23.807 --> 00:31:29.267 And then, yeah, telephone, email, and social media allows you to maintain this sort of wider beat. 00:31:30.470 --> 00:31:35.470 The core thing is, it's not just about writing in a voice, but it's also being 00:31:35.470 --> 00:31:38.990 a sort of an accessible human being that people can interact with. 00:31:39.550 --> 00:31:46.030 And we sort of understand this, because in many ways, lots of discussion at 00:31:46.030 --> 00:31:47.930 the moment about the intersection between journalism and influencers, 00:31:48.110 --> 00:31:49.710 and I think that is an important part of it. 00:31:50.090 --> 00:31:53.630 But how can we... We do a hard time to show on that. 00:31:53.790 --> 00:31:56.710 We can, but it's related as an idea, which I want to touch on briefly, 00:31:56.890 --> 00:31:59.590 if you don't mind, which is the how can we 00:31:59.590 --> 00:32:02.410 steal the best bits of influencer culture without corrupting what 00:32:02.410 --> 00:32:05.030 we do is basically the question we've got and the 00:32:05.030 --> 00:32:09.070 best bits of influencer culture is they they acknowledge and 00:32:09.070 --> 00:32:12.590 seek to if not directly interact 00:32:12.590 --> 00:32:17.690 with their audience they um create an at least illusion of interaction with 00:32:17.690 --> 00:32:22.130 their audience by talking directly to them by periodically replying to stuff 00:32:22.130 --> 00:32:25.730 from the audience feeling a sense that they actually pay attention to and care 00:32:25.730 --> 00:32:30.730 about the audience and there are times in journalism where we almost take a pride in not doing that. 00:32:31.690 --> 00:32:34.950 Because we are the mighty journalists in the mighty newsroom yeah 00:32:34.950 --> 00:32:38.070 we know things and we're feeding it down to you civilians i totally 00:32:38.070 --> 00:32:41.390 agree with that you you end your piece 00:32:41.390 --> 00:32:44.610 if you don't mind me the spoiler by saying we 00:32:44.610 --> 00:32:47.490 can build a stage for a new renaissance of journalism in the 00:32:47.490 --> 00:32:50.970 2030s which is a really nice positive way 00:32:50.970 --> 00:32:54.050 to end the sort of i hear 00:32:54.050 --> 00:32:56.850 so much about sort of an ai apocalypse in media 00:32:56.850 --> 00:32:59.610 and journalism and you clearly don't feel 00:32:59.610 --> 00:33:02.310 that but i just where are we going 00:33:02.310 --> 00:33:07.330 to be in five years time okay so i mean i'm i suppose i'm just tired i've been 00:33:07.330 --> 00:33:11.610 hearing about the the web apocalypse of journalism or the social media apocalypse 00:33:11.610 --> 00:33:15.850 of journalism or the mobile apocalypse of journalism or the social video apocalypse 00:33:15.850 --> 00:33:20.290 of journalism it's like journalism survives because i think journalism. 00:33:22.197 --> 00:33:25.457 Is adjacent enough to those fundamental human needs 00:33:25.457 --> 00:33:28.177 that people will always find a way 00:33:28.177 --> 00:33:31.857 of doing it it doesn't matter how much so 00:33:31.857 --> 00:33:35.017 fundamentally i don't think it matters how much the existing news 00:33:35.017 --> 00:33:40.117 organizations stumble and die journalism itself will to quote jurassic park 00:33:40.117 --> 00:33:46.817 of all things will find its way um but because people have have a not a deep 00:33:46.817 --> 00:33:50.437 fundamental need but it's so adjacent to those fundamental needs that people 00:33:50.437 --> 00:33:52.977 will seek it and other people will seek to provide it. 00:33:53.597 --> 00:33:56.397 I think local news is a really good example of this because i'm 00:33:56.397 --> 00:33:59.197 being very intentionally not naming anyone but i'm being 00:33:59.197 --> 00:34:02.837 slightly um scathing about centralized production 00:34:02.837 --> 00:34:05.817 hubs and things like that i do imagine who 00:34:05.817 --> 00:34:08.797 you're thinking of it's a mystery isn't it um yeah 00:34:08.797 --> 00:34:11.737 we're really reaching for a solution here but um 00:34:11.737 --> 00:34:14.857 what i'm what i 00:34:14.857 --> 00:34:17.657 think is there's some part of me that believes unless something 00:34:17.657 --> 00:34:20.437 dramatic changes that actually it's quite 00:34:20.437 --> 00:34:23.537 a good thing if the exist is some of the existing local news media 00:34:23.537 --> 00:34:26.617 companies just burned down because they're creating that 00:34:26.617 --> 00:34:30.097 space for the really interesting startups 00:34:30.097 --> 00:34:37.117 to grow and whether you look at um yeah the whole forest of them including jim 00:34:37.117 --> 00:34:41.437 mortison's one in london if you look at mill media doing it all across the uk 00:34:41.437 --> 00:34:44.257 you see that stuff to me is really 00:34:44.257 --> 00:34:47.017 exciting and really interesting it's a different model of journalism. 00:34:47.617 --> 00:34:51.157 And a lot of it is very rooted in understanding the people there, 00:34:51.297 --> 00:34:54.657 what they care about, getting out there and interviewing core people, 00:34:55.157 --> 00:34:58.397 you know, bring, you know, and AI is never going to be a good interviewer. 00:34:58.517 --> 00:35:00.797 That's just not what they are set up to do. 00:35:01.177 --> 00:35:06.097 And therefore, you know, those sorts of fundamental journalism skills of being 00:35:06.097 --> 00:35:09.717 out there amongst people, bringing, finding the stories, building the connections 00:35:09.717 --> 00:35:14.337 between the people people want to hear about and the things they want to hear. 00:35:15.166 --> 00:35:18.946 I think that's the exciting bit. I think that's something that can constantly 00:35:18.946 --> 00:35:23.146 regenerate. I don't think journalism is synonymous with the businesses that are doing it right now. 00:35:24.046 --> 00:35:26.826 And we see this all over the world. If you look at places in the world where 00:35:26.826 --> 00:35:32.966 the mainstream press are enslaved to the state in various ways, 00:35:32.986 --> 00:35:34.886 or have been crushed by the state, 00:35:35.486 --> 00:35:38.786 and you see independent startup businesses, 00:35:39.366 --> 00:35:42.626 startup journalists, maybe under great threat to their lives, they 00:35:42.626 --> 00:35:45.646 still do it because the necessity of that journalism is 00:35:45.646 --> 00:35:48.526 still there it's still adjacent not to keep saying these 00:35:48.526 --> 00:35:51.586 fundamental human needs so i think journalism will always find a 00:35:51.586 --> 00:35:55.286 way our our job is perhaps to just 00:35:55.286 --> 00:35:58.206 be a little bit more realistic than we've been in the past and say actually 00:35:58.206 --> 00:36:02.966 no this is going to hit us so let's let's actually try and build something that's 00:36:02.966 --> 00:36:08.106 a bit more resilient in our structure that means we have these fundamental relationships 00:36:08.106 --> 00:36:14.986 again bugbear of mine but i would I would argue that, arguably, 00:36:15.346 --> 00:36:19.966 a lot of people have argued the original sin of journalism in the 2000s was not charging for it. 00:36:20.826 --> 00:36:24.606 Don't necessarily agree completely because people tried. And there were some 00:36:24.606 --> 00:36:28.226 areas that succeeded and other places didn't. But maybe more people should have experimented more. 00:36:29.237 --> 00:36:37.097 For me, the sin of the 2010s was we let go of the relationship between ourselves and our audiences. 00:36:37.877 --> 00:36:44.017 And we let Facebook and, to a lesser extent, Twitter and certainly Google sit 00:36:44.017 --> 00:36:45.177 between us and our audiences. 00:36:45.477 --> 00:36:49.297 And because that traffic was so free and easy, relatively speaking, 00:36:49.317 --> 00:36:51.917 for so long, we just got used to it. 00:36:52.217 --> 00:36:56.777 And all the sort of community initiatives that some of us were working on in the 2000s got shelved. 00:36:56.857 --> 00:36:59.957 It's like, oh, no, we'll just do a Facebook group. oh no we'll do a facebook page oh 00:36:59.957 --> 00:37:02.877 we're on x we don't care about the rest of twitter we don't care about the 00:37:02.877 --> 00:37:05.957 rest of it and i think that was a terrible mistake and 00:37:05.957 --> 00:37:08.897 we had a decade where we could 00:37:08.897 --> 00:37:11.957 have been building relationships with our readers taking the 00:37:11.957 --> 00:37:14.757 ones that came in via social via search and then 00:37:14.757 --> 00:37:18.797 making them our readers and if we had done that i think we'd be in a much better 00:37:18.797 --> 00:37:24.137 position to face the ai apocalypse than we are right now so to just to wrap 00:37:24.137 --> 00:37:28.057 up what you're i I see what I'm getting from you is that really what we need 00:37:28.057 --> 00:37:33.377 to focus on in the next five years and going forward is owning those relationships. Yes, absolutely. 00:37:33.877 --> 00:37:38.677 AI might be a useful tool. In fact, not may. It is going to be a useful tool. Absolutely. 00:37:39.597 --> 00:37:45.257 But the core thing to own is the relationship between producer and audience. Yes. 00:37:45.957 --> 00:37:49.777 And I also think, the other thing I think is there's going to be the real danger 00:37:49.777 --> 00:37:51.677 point for us is going to come in about three years' time. 00:37:52.508 --> 00:37:55.608 Maybe less, maybe more. But at some point, there's going to be a bit of an AI 00:37:55.608 --> 00:37:57.068 bust. I think that's inevitable. 00:37:57.648 --> 00:38:00.628 You know, we're using AI for things it's not good at. There's going to be a 00:38:00.628 --> 00:38:02.808 back pull. Some of the companies are going to collapse because they're not going 00:38:02.808 --> 00:38:05.628 to be able to put revenues to back their valuations. 00:38:06.188 --> 00:38:08.028 And at that point, everyone's going to go, oh, it's going away. 00:38:08.248 --> 00:38:12.528 In the way that lots of people did around 2000, oh, the internet's going away. It was not taken out. 00:38:13.028 --> 00:38:16.208 It will come back. It ain't going away. And it will come back much better because 00:38:16.208 --> 00:38:20.348 we'll have a better sense of what this tool is actually useful for then. 00:38:20.348 --> 00:38:25.688 And if we just fall back into our old habits next time the threat decreases 00:38:25.688 --> 00:38:29.188 a bit then we've missed an opportunity as we have done in the past. 00:38:30.653 --> 00:38:35.873 Yeah, it's been a fascinating conversation. I really agree with a lot of what you have to say on this. 00:38:36.293 --> 00:38:42.153 Head over to AdamsOneManInHisBlog.com to read his full manifesto. 00:38:42.233 --> 00:38:44.033 I'll obviously link to it in the show notes as well. 00:38:44.673 --> 00:38:49.833 Adam, thanks so much for joining me. Remind people where they can come and connect with you. 00:38:50.133 --> 00:38:53.433 Well, generally speaking, you can find everything from, as you say, One Man In His Blog. 00:38:53.693 --> 00:38:57.213 But on most social platforms, you will find me at. 00:38:58.013 --> 00:39:00.713 Sorry at at adders a double d 00:39:00.713 --> 00:39:03.353 e r s which was a nickname given to me 00:39:03.353 --> 00:39:06.113 by the second editor i ever worked for i tend 00:39:06.113 --> 00:39:09.593 to use it on social platforms ever since i'm at 00:39:09.593 --> 00:39:13.253 charlotte a henry across pretty much all social platforms obviously 00:39:13.253 --> 00:39:16.873 i'd love you to head to the edition.net uh subscribe 00:39:16.873 --> 00:39:19.913 it helps keep that human connected independent journalism 00:39:19.913 --> 00:39:22.893 we've just been talking about i am a subscriber 00:39:22.893 --> 00:39:26.353 you are and i deeply appreciate it um 00:39:26.353 --> 00:39:29.673 and i have a new book out streaming wars is 00:39:29.673 --> 00:39:32.613 out in the uk and lots of other countries right now 00:39:32.613 --> 00:39:36.613 it will be out in a few days time if you're listening to this in the united 00:39:36.613 --> 00:39:42.193 states comes out about the 28th of october over in the us so i would love you 00:39:42.193 --> 00:39:47.053 dearly if you also bought a copy of that i hope you find it interesting by stunning 00:39:47.053 --> 00:39:50.393 coincidence there's a copy on the table behind her if you're watching this. 00:39:50.593 --> 00:39:53.233 I don't know how it got there. Absolute mystery again, isn't it? 00:39:53.493 --> 00:39:55.033 No idea how that got there. 00:39:55.333 --> 00:40:00.653 But yes, I hope you read and enjoy that book. Adam, thank you once again for joining me.