Fake news? Why real-life journalists trump artificial intelligence-based content generation

Repeat those words and the image of President Donald Trump is likely to appear in your imagination. However, despite the fact that President Trump is due to be sworn in for his second term of office around the time this magazine goes to press, and despite the fact that tyre-market-impacting tariffs will no-doubt be part of his second term, he and his opinions of what constitutes news are not the subject of this column. Rather, there are two further and completely distinct reasons to engage with the idiom “fake news”.

Firstly, one tyre manufacturer decided to deploy that term as part of a rebuttal statement against media allegations published and re-published in the winter of 2024. And secondly, because increasing use of AI raises questions about the nature of such media information and brings the need for first-rate critical evaluation to the fore.

The first point refers to Linglong of course, which has been working to rebut claims relating to its labour practices, claims which are not new but which reared their head again at the end of 2024 with negative implications for the Chinese tyremaker’s relations with well-known truck OEM, MAN, at least. I won’t go into that subject any more here because we have covered it in some detail in the Company News section of this January edition of the magazine. See pages 26 to 28 for all the details.

The second point is a deliberate reference to the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) news and information websites. As we mentioned in our Trends & Facts special issue, which is out now for existing subscribers and available for purchase to all other readers, AI used in the sphere of news gathering has some fatal strategic flaws.

Referring to AI as the future can be somewhat misleading, as it is already present and actively utilized. AI’s numerous advantages are evident in various fields, including tyre development, where it accelerates the development and testing processes through virtual modelling, and manufacturing, where it is employed in quality control.

Despite its impressive capabilities, AI fundamentally depends on pre-existing data. It excels in virtual tyre testing due to the abundance of real-world vehicle and tyre data available. This data can be quickly modified and re-tested, significantly reducing the time needed for tyre development and the lag in producing real-world prototypes. Consequently, this generates more real-world data to further enhance AI capabilities. Without this real-world data, AI’s effectiveness would be severely limited.

In the realm of marketing, AI is particularly adept at swiftly processing and producing written content. However, its performance is contingent upon the quality of input data it receives. During my recent presentation at the NTDA’s Tyre Industry Conference, I highlighted an example of an AI-reliant website that published an automatically rewritten article using information from our exclusive visit to a tyre factory on the other side of the world. It was immediately apparent that no other report could replicate this, as no one else was present. The same site illustrated another of its stories with a photo that our team of journalists was indeed there – and they weren’t. This underscores that, while AI can expedite content creation, it cannot physically attend events or gather insider information about future market developments.

Indeed, within the policy pages of this particular website, it boasts that it “avoids distinguishing unnecessarily between: authors or publishers who call themselves news organisations and those who do not; authors or publishers with explicit or hidden biases; articles reviewed by editors or those published without review”. In other words, it doesn’t offer critical evaluation of its sources. It doesn’t fact-check. It can’t make any truth claims.

AI relies on input and therefore real-life journalists are always at the top of the food chain. In addition, AI is by definition immaterial. AI lives in the cloud, but tyres are fitted in garages and run on the road. In other words, without real-life journalists feeding the algorithm (whether they know it or not), and without professional curating, editing and critical evaluating sources, all that’s left is part-worn news-copy at best and fake news at worst.

In contrast, this month’s Tyres & Accessories brings you all the latest news an analysis you have come to expect. Furthermore, this month’s edition features special features on the Agricultural Tyre sector (see page 42 onwards) as well as Tyre Pressure Monitoring Systems (TPMS) and sensor technology (page 14 on).

This article – from the forthcoming January edition – is an example of the editorial comment that introduces every edition of Tyres & Accessories magazine. Not a subscriber? No problem, click here to become one.