Madrid (EFE).- Representatives of twenty-three international news agencies are analyzing in Madrid how to apply technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and data to carry out their work more effectively and provide better service to their clients.
The Minds (Media Innovation Network) consortium, in which 23 agencies from Europe, America, Asia and Oceania participate, brings together executives in Madrid who exchange experiences on information, commercial and technological aspects for two days.
Thus, in this meeting organized by the EFE Agency, they discuss how to become a data-based press agency, how to take advantage of artificial intelligence for video collaboration, digital transformation, new products capable of reaching new audiences and the way to have new income.
The role of artificial intelligence in agencies
For the executive director of Minds, Martjin Bennis, a greater investment in technologies is necessary, especially in artificial intelligence, which can help in the information processes of the agencies, as he explained to EFE during a break in the meeting.
The consortium’s managing director, Wolfgang Nedomansky, admitted the fears AI raises, but also noted the “opportunities” it can bring.
It is about “how to use artificial intelligence correctly”, according to Nedomansky, who acknowledged that it is a “common dilemma” for the media, but advanced that the objective is to “produce content in a more efficient way”.
“You have to offer new services based on AI,” said the managing director, for whom it is not exclusively an issue that affects agencies, but the media in general.
The data can also help find stories to cover and tell customers, he added.
For Bennis, the way to find new income – another of the topics of the Madrid meeting – does not have an easy answer, but it involves giving “added value” to the services provided to subscribers.
“There are services that can be shared and that would be cheaper for clients than if they developed them,” added the Minds executive.
Verification of news or fact-checking
Another of the issues present at the meeting is the verification of news or fact-checking, an interesting path, but without forgetting – according to Bennis – that journalists must be verifiers and nothing can be published that has not been previously verified.
Since the Minds international network was created in 2007, new partners have been incorporated and it is currently made up of twenty-three entities, including the main agencies integrated into the European Alliance of News Agencies (EANA), such as EFE; the American Associated Press, the Japanese Kyodo, the Turkish AA, the Australian AAP or the Canadian CP.
Apart from the interventions of the agency managers, the Minds meeting in Madrid has the participation of guests such as Caro Kriel, general director of the Thomson Foundation; Greg Pichota, Research Resident at the International News Media Association; Rosalía Lloret, general director of elDiario.es (Spain), and Ángel Villarino, deputy director of El Confidencial (Spain).
Cañas: “Agencies are more essential than ever”
The meeting was opened today by the president of the EFE Agency, Gabriela Cañas, for whom the agencies “are more essential than ever.”
This is because, in the face of the disinformation dissemination capacity of the networks, they provide their clients and citizens with the security of compliance with “very important ethical and deontological standards”: “In the near future we are going to experience the splendor of news agencies news,” he said.