Last week our general manager Paul Jacobs asked everyone in our office to envision what the ideal radio station looks like in 2030 — if it’s built from the ground up. It’s a tough challenge for most of us who spend our waking lives constantly juggling daily industry news, monthly ratings, and quarterly budgets.
The challenge is even more formidable when you consider that AI is accelerating the rate of change. Stations are using tools that did not exist six months ago that are built with technologies that did not exist two years ago.
A big uncertainty is how people’s feelings about AI will shift as it becomes more integrated into daily life. One of Bill Gate’s recommended summer reads is Brave New Words by Salman Khan of Khan Academy, explores some possibilities. Khan envisions AI teaching assistants that accompany 
every student through their schooling. They customize curriculum and provide emotional support, much like an omniscient, empathetic Dumbledore. This concept would have seemed decades-off only a couple years ago; yet the KhanAmigo software is available now — free for teachers, $4/month for families.
Our Jacobs Media Techsurvey 2024 indicated that current audiences are wary of AI, particularly AI DJs. However, how will Generation Alpha, having grown up with AI companions in their education, view this technology when they enter adulthood in 2030? Their evolving opinions will inevitably shape the future of programming. The answers to these questions are yet to be written.
In next week’s AI EDGE: How one station cluster is using AI to help the sales department!
NEW AI CREATIONS
‘Eno’ Movie Is a Generative Film With 52 Quintillion Variations
The movie about visionary music producer and ambient sound pioneer Brian Eno opened last weekend in NYC and London. The film uses a code-based decision tree to meld together a unique narrative from 30 hours of interviews and 500 hours of film, ensuring that every screening is unique. Seems appropriate for the man who not only composed the Windows 95 sound logo but also released over thirty “generative music” albums. Details
WaPo Launches Bot to Answer Readers’ News Questions
The Washington Post has taken it’s substantial catalog of environmental reporting to build an AI bot. CTO Vineet Khosla told the Verge, “Somewhere in the years and years of the data-rich reporting we have done, there is an answer” to questions readers have. What a great template for broadcasters with podcast and website archives. See the Post‘s bot now.
Weather Network Creates AI Hyper-Local Forecasts at Hardware Stores Across Ontario
This summer, the cable channel is showing weather forecasts for the 377 Ontario Home Hardware locations, presented by Rachel Schoutsen — with an assist from AI. Content includes storefront and local store callouts where Rachel’s AI-Assisted Avatar covers an Ontario summer forecast, plus a summer sale call to action. Details
YouTube Launches Two New AI-Music Products
This week YouTube announced two new features for paid YouTube Music subscribers. The first is a Shazam-esque tool that allows users to hum a song into the app to get artist/title identification. The second tool, called “AI-generated conversational radio,” allows you to create a playlist based on a text prompt, such as “happy beach music.” This feature is similar to one introduced by Spotify in April. Details
USC Psychology Experiment on Comedy Has Shocking Results
In a jaw-dropping revelation, research from the University of California Mind and Society Center has unveiled that gig workers, who signed up to deliver humorous responses, are being out-funnied by none other than ChatGPT 3.5!
PhD student Drew Gorenz conducted a hilarious experiment, asking both anonymous human users and ChatGPT to come up with funny answers to prompts like, “A lesser talked about room in the White House: ___.” The punchline? A second group of humans rated these responses, and guess what? ChatGPT stole the show by being slightly funnier in all three tests!
Is this the end of human humor as we know it? Imagine if they teamed up! Details
Originally published by Jacobs Media
