Venezuela’s Communications Ministry didn’t reply to a request for touch upon the AI journalism initiative. [File]
| Picture credit score: REUTERS
Certainly one of Venezuela’s latest information anchors sits on a stool, wearing a flannel shirt and chinos, as he presents the day’s headlines.
They name him “El Pana”, a time period that in Venezuelan slang means “good friend.”
Solely he isn’t actual.
El Pana and his colleague “La Chama” or “La Niña” are generated by synthetic intelligence, though they appear, sound and transfer realistically.
They have been created as a part of an initiative referred to as “Operation Retweet” by the Colombian group Connectas, led by its director Carlos Huertas, to publish information from a dozen unbiased media shops in Venezuela and within the course of shield journalists as the federal government has launched an offensive in opposition to journalists and protesters.
“We determined to make use of synthetic intelligence to be the ‘face’ of the data we’re publishing,” Huertas mentioned in an interview, “as a result of our colleagues who’re nonetheless doing their jobs face far more threat.”
A minimum of 10 journalists have been arrested since mid-June and eight stay in jail on costs together with terrorism, based on Reporters With out Borders.
“Right here, utilizing synthetic intelligence is… virtually like a mixture between know-how and journalism,” Huertas mentioned, explaining that the venture sought to “evade persecution and rising repression” by the federal government, since there can be nobody who may very well be arrested.
The nation’s opposition and human rights teams have mentioned the latest arrests of protesters, opposition figures and journalists are a part of a authorities offensive aimed toward calming a generally violent, month-long election dispute.
Venezuela’s communications ministry didn’t reply to a request for touch upon AI’s journalism initiative. No officers responded to Reuters’ repeated requests for touch upon the arrests of journalists in latest weeks.
Each the opposition and President Nicolás Maduro declare to have gained the July 28 elections.
Maduro, in energy since 2013, has the backing of the Supreme Court docket and the electoral authority, which has not revealed a full vote rely due to what it says was a cyberattack.
The opposition has shared what it says is greater than 80% of the vote rely, displaying a convincing victory for its candidate Edmundo Gonzalez. Some worldwide observers and plenty of Western nations have mentioned the electoral situations have been unfair and have demanded full recounts.
Protests because the vote have led to not less than 27 deaths and a pair of,400 arrests, with detentions of opposition figures and protesters persevering with as a part of the federal government’s “Operation Toc Toc.”
Maduro and his administration have referred to as protesters fascists and mentioned they’re inciting hatred on the behest of nations like america, one thing Washington denies.