Microsoft is replacing journalists with artificial intelligence.
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The company laid off about 50 news producer contractors.
Microsoft has announced that it will not renew the contracts of about XNUMX news producers working for MSN. The firm said these positions will be replaced by artificial intelligence, reported the Seattle Times.
“Like all companies, we regularly evaluate our activities”, a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement.
“This may mean increased investment in some places and, from time to time, redeployment in others. These decisions are not the result of the current pandemic. »
The laid-off employees were told on Wednesday that their services would no longer be needed beyond June 30.
Full-time news producers will be retained by the company. However, all contracted news producers will be terminated.
Le Seattle Times spoke with some employees on condition of anonymity and said that MSN will use artificial intelligence to replace the production work they used to do, such as identifying new trends and optimizing content.
"It was semi-automated for a few months, but now it's in full swing", said one of the dismissed contractors. “It's demoralizing to think that machines can replace us, but there you go. »
A staff member who was made redundant told the Guardian :
“I spend my time reading about how automation and AI are going to take all our jobs, and here I am – AI has taken my job. »
This person also warned that it was risky to replace journalists with software. Human workers can stick to “very strict editorial guidelines” which ensure that viewers do not receive inappropriate content.
This is particularly concerning when it comes to young viewers. Artificial intelligence may not be able to recognize particularly violent or bad taste content.
source: Interesting Engineering - Translated by Something fishy
Because of the pandemic, robots will take jobs even faster, around 50 million jobs could be automated
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The health crisis triggered by Covid-19 is hitting businesses hard and also impinging on the functioning of supply chains. Human contact is discouraged and the industry is already suffering from it.
Anxious to immunize these parts of the economy against the negative impacts of the disease, more and more companies are beginning to substitute certain workers with robots. According to a new report this week, the pace of automation could be faster than previously predicted due to the coronavirus.
The constraints imposed by Covid-19 no longer allow employees to go to their workplaces or to work as before. Social contacts and supply chains are disrupted by the coronavirus. If the situation persists, essential industries could be hit hard. According to a report by MarketWatch, American companies are jumping into the acquisition of robots in the thousands in an attempt to limit the damage. Thus, around 50 million jobs could be automated in essential sectors alone.
According to the report, further automation, with ever more powerful robots and computers, can help immunize the economy against future pandemics. This action is warranted in particular for two groups of industries that have recently come to the fore: essential industries, which comprise large parts of the manufacturing supply chain, and industries in direct contact with customers, also known as labor-intensive industries.
These two categories overlap. For example, about half of customer-facing industries are considered essential. In any case, this is an irreversible change and millions of people will have to reorient themselves in the coming years. Whether to rely on automation to prevent its so-called essential industries from suffering the harmful effects of a future pandemic or being shut down completely, the report's data shows that a large number of Americans could lose their jobs within the next fifteen years.
About 54% of all jobs in the United States are in industries classified as essential by the Department of Homeland Security, and 67% of these jobs corresponding to 52% of wages are likely to be automated. In fact, it is low-wage jobs, such as retail and warehouse jobs, that are most at risk. By comparison, high-tech industries account for 46% of jobs (with some overlap with essential industries), and 57% of those jobs are vulnerable.
The social distancing measure affects contact industries like restaurants and bars, retail and leisure. According to an Oxford study cited by the report, the world should have the right technology to automate almost 86% of restaurant jobs, 76% of retail jobs and about 59% of leisure jobs. here 2035. Social contact is appreciated by customers, but some analysts believe that after the passage of Covid-19, they will necessarily change their behavior.
This means that some customers at all times and almost all customers at certain times will appreciate avoiding contact with staff. This dramatically changes the mix of restaurant preferences and offerings. On the other hand, larger companies, especially those considering rehiring, will think twice before deciding whether a particular job can be done by a machine. Robots are becoming more efficient per hour to complete tasks and less and less expensive per minute.
According to the report, the cost advantages will be reinforced by the perception of risks. He also cites the fact that some stores like Amazon Go are already fully automated and that Amazon is about to start commercializing its technology. In this case, retail as we know it today might be limited to small stores, if they can survive. Next door, Ford Motor's prototype delivery van features a robot that brings packages from the vehicle to the door.
Ford Motor is targeting a multi-billion dollar market. According to some estimates, ABB, a Swiss-Swedish company, has already installed more than 400.000 industrial robots, replacing more than 2 million workers. According to the report, the environment for automation has never been better. Very low interest rates, large sectors with low added value per employee with repetitive tasks, exponential growth of patents involving artificial intelligence are all elements showing accelerated automation.
According to Johannes Moenius, the author of the report, it is clear that companies see this automation as a measure to protect essential industries and supply chains against the next virus attack. They must also meet the needs of customers who prefer remote services. It is a transformation that will be observed little by little after the passage of the coronavirus. He is accelerating and changing a technological shock that has been brewing for more than a decade.
sources: Expand - MarketWatch
Source (s): Leblogalupus.com via Anonymous Contributor
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