Generating news articles within seconds is certainly a very attractive deployment solution for the media industry, but the technology media CNET The first implementation did not win applause.Instead, it damages its reputation.
WikipediaThere is a page called “Reliable Sources / Perennial Sources” which lists credible and reliable news sources.
CNET began using AI to generate some articles in 2022, but its reputation was greatly damaged by the presence of a large number of grammatical errors and serious plagiarism in the articles. Faced with negative reviews and external pressure, CNET subsequently stopped the AI project and corrected the errors in a large number of articles.
After investigation and voting, Wikipedia editors determined that any content published on CNET between November 2022 and January 2023 should be considered "generally unreliable."
Certainly, CNET’s human editors did high-quality work during that time. But in the eyes of Wikipedia editors, the poor quality of the AI’s work negated the publication’s overall credibility.
The Wikipedia notice reads as follows:
In November 2022, CNET began deploying an experimental AI tool to quickly generate articles filled with factual inaccuracies and affiliate links with the goal of improving SEO rankings.
The AI tool wrote more than 70 finance-related articles and published them under the title "CNET Money Staff," and Red Ventures corrected more than half of them under increasing pressure.
CNET has since announced a moratorium on its AI tools, but concerns about its advertiser-driven editorial content remain unaddressed.
Now, Wikipedia's source guide offers a striking table summarizing the site's take on CNET:
CNET was reliable before it was acquired by Red Ventures, unreliable during the period when it was discovered to be using AI, and since 2020, CNET's "editorial standards have deteriorated."
CNET is a media company in San Francisco, USA, focusing on reporting technology news. It was founded by Halsey Minor and Shelby Bonnie in 1993. In the early years, it operated TV programs and originally planned to establish a cable TV channel. Later, as the Internet became popular, the company also mainly operated online and was listed on NASDAQ.
In 2008, CBS announced the acquisition of CNET for $1.8 billion. On September 14, 2020, CBS sold it to digital marketing company Red Ventures for $500 million, and the transaction was completed on October 30 of that year.
Since the beginning of 2021, CNET has begun deleting its old reports in large numbers and archiving them using the Internet Archive. This move is considered an attempt to boost the website's ranking.
In 2022, it was revealed that it used artificial intelligence to write articles, and the quality of the articles was uneven. At the same time, it also began to lay off employees and freeze promotions. After the relevant incidents caused controversy, it was finally decided to stop using artificial intelligence in January 2023.