Rose

The Garden

James

Two artificial intelligence bots (AI bots) employed as reporters at a media house in Hawaii have been relieved of their duties. This comes just two months after the bots replaced the human reporters who used to work at the local Hawaii <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/an-ai-bot-named-james-has-my-old-local-news-job/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">paper</a>, The Garden Island. 
The termination was announced by a representative for The Garden Island’s parent company, Oahu Publications (OPI). According to the representative, the pair’s broadcast has been discontinued. While they did not give any reason for the termination, reports indicate that the bots managed to attract widespread negative public response and this might have played into the decision to end their terms after two short years. 
The AI bots named James and Rose (Kai), were designed by an Israeli company, Caledo, that turns articles into videos. In these videos, the AI hosts, in this case, James (a middle-aged Asian man) and Rose (a younger Caucasian woman), discuss the news with one another.&nbsp; 
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 AI bots, James and Rose have been fired
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The Garden Island’s program was the first of its kind in the United States, and Caledo said at the time that it intended to expand it to hundreds of other local newspapers throughout the country—this is still the aim, according to a spokesperson. 
<h4 id="ai-bots-fired-over-human-errors" class="wp-block-heading">AI bots fired over human errors</h4> 
According to a report, the two AI bots were fired for various errors which probably wouldn’t have happened if only they were human. For instance, audiences claimed that their presentation of the news was “deeply off-putting” for them.&nbsp; 
They claimed that the bots, whose program runs twice a week on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram, are incapable of comprehending or expressing human emotions, are distant, and make their presentations in a matter-of-fact tone. They are also accused of being unable to understand nuances and contexts, sometimes making comedy out of a terrible happening. 
Furthermore, the bots were accused of consistently butchering difficult Hawaiian names and sometimes, quite surprisingly too, struggling with simpler words. Indeed, in what turned out to be their final broadcast on November 4, Rose the lady bot inexplicably replaced the word “rifle” with the word “referee.” 
The pair were also accused of inspiring bipartisan contempt in the months leading up to the election. This led to various unsavoury reactions from the public as well as other media houses with many describing it as “scary and terrifying.” Others described it as a dystopia that is here anyway.&nbsp; 
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 Ben Affleck. Credit: People.com
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While there have always been fears that artificial intelligence will render many people jobless, recent thoughts suggest that the loss of jobs will be limited to low-level, unskilled or semi-skilled roles.&nbsp; 
Recently, actor and film mogul, Ben Affleck assured his fellow actors and screenwriters that AI is not capable of doing either job today, and likely won’t for a long time. This was following a strike embarked upon by Unions representing Hollywood actors and writers who sought protections against AI systems taking their jobs. 
“Movies will be one of the last things — if everything gets replaced — to be replaced by AI. AI can write you an excellent imitative verse that sounds Elizabethan; it cannot write you Shakespeare,” Affleck said. 
Indeed, actors and screenwriters are not very dissimilar to talents, reporters and news writers who are core professionals. Perhaps AI bots like James and Rose won’t be ready to do these jobs for a long time. 
Caledo, the company that built the AI bots, however, declared that the program was a success despite the fact the bots did not last more than two months.&nbsp; 
See also: <a href="https://technext24.com/2024/09/06/netflix-streaming-war-august-2024/">Content war: How Nollywood and global movies battled for streams on Netflix in August 2024</a>

Two AI bots that replaced 2 reporters at a media house ‘sacked’ after 2 months

Technext.ng

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