A significant controversy emerged in Poland after the public radio station OFF Radio Krakow relaunched, substituting AI-generated avatars for its human journalists.
Based in the southern city of Krakow, the station promoted this as a national first, with virtual personalities, created using advanced AI algorithms, delivering information on social, cultural, and artistic topics, including LGBTQ+ issues.
However, the public and former employees have vehemently opposed the move, which has sparked a contentious discussion about the function of AI in media and the potential harm of its unchecked use.
To appeal to a younger audience, the station, which had just let go of roughly a dozen journalists, including well-known individuals like Demski, who worked there from February 2022 to August 2023, debuted three AI-generated presenters.
Demski and many others have voiced their displeasure with the change, especially since the station is taxpayer-funded, which raises ethical and public accountability concerns. The concerns include the potential loss of human touch in journalism, the impact on the job market, and the ethical implications of using AI in a public service.
According to a CNN report, by the middle of the week, over 15,000 people had signed a petition against the station’s decision, and hundreds of people—many of them young people—had contacted the station to express their disapproval of being “subjects of an AI experiment.”
Pulit, the director of OFF Radio Krakow, has defended the move, refuting claims that journalists were let go to make room for AI. Instead, he underlined the station’s dwindling listenership, saying it was almost zero, and implied that the station needed to change to remain relevant.
However, the dispute has spurred more conversation, underscoring the urgent need for AI regulation in situations like this.
Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Affairs, Krzysztof Gawkowski, offered his thoughts on the subject, recognizing Demski’s worries and advocating for laws to control the application of AI in these situations. Although he praised the advancement of AI, he underlined that its application should help people rather than harm them, stressing the significance of boundaries in AI applications.
“Although I am a fan of AI development, I believe that certain boundaries are being crossed increasingly,” he wrote on X. “The widespread use of AI must be done for people, not against them!” he said.
The station’s controversial decision to broadcast an “interview” with the late Wisława Szymborska, the Polish poet who won the Nobel Prize and died in 2012, conducted by one of the AI avatars, was a startling step. This raised questions about the ethical use of AI in posthumous interviews and the potential impact on the legacy of the deceased.
Permission to use her name was granted by the Wisława Szymborska Foundation, which manages her literary heritage. According to foundation head Michał Rusinek, Szymborska had a sense of humor and probably would have enjoyed the idea.
However, a more profound dissatisfaction with AI’s expanding presence in traditionally human-centered fields like journalism is revealed by the public opposition. The future of journalism in the era of artificial intelligence, generational changes in media consumption, and the moral boundaries that must be established when public organizations use cutting-edge technology are all topics covered by this controversy.
The OFF Radio Krakow case will probably be a pivotal point to consider for upcoming discussions on the relationship between technology, labor, and the public interest as Poland and the rest of the globe struggle with these issues.
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