Robot Journalism

Abstract

This entry defines the practice of robot journalism, providing a comprehensive framework to enhance the understanding of it in terms of two conflicting approaches: techno‐optimism and techno‐pessimism. From the techno‐optimist viewpoint, which focuses on the advantages of new technologies, robot journalism is an efficient means of news production that helps news media organizations to produce a greater volume of news stories in a faster and a more cost‐effective manner than traditional news production. In contrast, from the techno‐pessimist perspective, robot journalism brings about serious risks and problems, such as the threat of unemployment for journalists, uncertain legal liabilities, and the probability of disinformation to readers due to the technical errors resulting from algorithmic news production.