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How does a 182-year-old global magazine stay ahead in the age of generative AI? This week on Newsroom Robots, host Nikita Roy is joined by Ludwig Siegele, Senior Editor for AI Initiatives at The Economist. After more than 25 years reporting from San Francisco, Berlin, and London, Siegele now leads the publication’s AI strategy. He discusses how The Economist launched its AI Lab—a startup-style group within the organization with the freedom to test bold ideas and move quickly. The lab is charged with looking years ahead, preparing for a future where much of journalism’s supply chain may be automated, and ensuring The Economist maintains its identity in an AI-driven media ecosystem.
From practical newsroom wins like AI-powered translation and research pipelines to more experimental projects such as TikTok video dubbing and the SCOTUS bot, Siegele explains how The Economist is testing, iterating, and learning in real time. He also reflects on what hasn’t worked, the challenges of newsroom adoption, and why the next phase of journalism may require redefining the role of the journalist itself.
In this episode:
00:00 – Introducing Ludwig Siegele & The Economist’s AI journey
01:31 – How AI experimentation began at The Economist
03:26 – Overcoming newsroom fear of ChatGPT
04:53 – Building AI infrastructure and upskilling staff
07:10 – The tools and vendor partnerships powering experiments
08:29 – Why adoption is harder than building tools
12:10 – Translation, research, and NotebookLM as newsroom game changers
16:06 – How automation could reshape the journalist’s role
18:41 – Launching The Economist AI Lab
24:11 – Audience-facing AI experiments (TikTok dubbing, Espresso app, SCOTUS bot)
26:05 – Partnering with Google NotebookLM while protecting the brand
30:02 – Scraping, monetization, and the future of publisher revenue
33:41 – Measuring ROI on AI initiatives
37:40 – The biggest barriers to newsroom AI adoption
39:14 – How Ludwig uses AI personally in art and culture
40:40 – Closing reflections
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In Estonia, Delfi Meedia has built one of the strongest foundations for AI in journalism. With one of the highest digital subscription rates in the world, Delfi has moved beyond the buzz around AI to put it into everyday practice, supporting both its journalism and business.
In this episode, host Nikita Roy is joined by Ivar Krustok, Chief AI & Innovation Officer at Delfi Meedia. Ivar breaks down how a small-market publisher is shipping AI that actually helps journalists: from live cross-language translation and newsroom bots to an in-house “company ChatGPT” toolkit wired into 25 years of archives and public records.
Key topics include:
•Delfi’s three-bucket AI strategy: everyday newsroom tools, experimental long-term projects, and company-wide literacy.
•Why Delfi built its own “company ChatGPT” toolkit to search 25 years of archives.
•How bots and agents are transforming dashboards into conversational tools for subscriptions, ads, and editorial performance.
•Lessons from AI experiments, from court-case monitoring that surfaces hidden stories to audience-facing image generators.
•The ongoing challenge of scaling AI literacy across hundreds of staff while keeping adoption practical and trust-centered.
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As a new academic year begins, journalism schools face a defining challenge: how to prepare students for a profession being reshaped by AI.
At Stanford University, Djordje Padejski is leading the way. A veteran investigative journalist and now associate director of the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships at Stanford, he created one of the earliest AI-focused journalism courses at Arizona State University before bringing it to Stanford last year. His classroom is less lecture hall and more lab, where students test AI tools and also learn to examine them.
On Newsroom Robots, Djordje shared how he structures his course and what journalism schools must do to prepare the next generation of journalists.
Key topics include:
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In this episode, host Nikita Roy is joined by Sara Beykpour, co-founder and CEO of Particle News — the AI-powered news aggregator. Launched in November 2024, Particle blends multi-perspective coverage, concise AI-generated summaries, and a bias meter that makes framing visible, giving readers both speed and trust in the same experience.
Key topics include:
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What if the future of journalism isn’t locked behind the paywalls of big tech companies, but freely available to every newsroom willing to embrace it?
Too often, the conversation around AI in newsrooms centers on big tech, like OpenAI’s ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini. These are powerful tools, no doubt but they come with caveats: mainly cost, limited transparency, and little to no control over where your data ends up.
But there’s another world of AI rapidly evolving in parallel and it might be journalism’s best path forward: open-source AI.
In this episode of Newsroom Robots, host Nikita Roy reconnects with returning guest Florent Daudens, now the Press Lead at Hugging Face, one of the leading platforms powering open source AI. Formerly a newsroom leader driving AI integration at Canada’s Radio-Canada, Florent now sits at the heart of the open source AI movement.
Key topics include:
Plus, Florent shares 20 must-know open source AI tools for journalists, explains how writing is building in the age of AI, and discusses why owning the experience, not just the content, will be key to journalism’s survival
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In this live episode of Newsroom Robots, host Nikita Roy moderates a panel discussion recorded at the Nordic AI and Media Summit in Copenhagen. The conversation features Gard Steiro (Editor-in-Chief and CEO of VG in Norway), Fabian Heckenberger (Managing Editor and Senior Editor for AI at Süddeutsche Zeitung in Germany), and Naja Nielsen (Media Director at SVT in Sweden and former Digital Director at BBC News).
They discuss how news organizations are approaching the complexities of integrating AI into editorial workflows, organizational strategy, and audience experiences. The conversation focuses on the tensions, trade-offs, and open questions that newsroom leaders are wrestling with.
Key topics include:
The episode wraps with a candid exchange about whether the article format has outlived its usefulness in an era of personalized, multimodal news delivery and what that means for the future of storytelling and journalistic impact.
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In this live episode, host Nikita Roy sits down with Gina Chua, Executive Editor of Semafor, recorded at an event at New York University hosted in collaboration with the AI networking group, Humans in the Loop. Gina brings a uniquely expansive lens to the AI conversation, grounded in her leadership across global newsrooms—from Reuters and The Wall Street Journal to the South China Morning Post. Now at Semafor, she continues to be a leading voice rethinking the information ecosystem for an AI-driven world.
In this wide-ranging and candid conversation, Gina explores how generative AI is reshaping the fundamental architecture of journalism—from editorial workflows and business models to the core definition of a story. She discusses her team’s experiments with building custom AI tools like Miso, a multilingual aggregation system powering Semafor’s Signals format.
Key topics include:
The episode closes with reflections on Gina’s personal coding journey with AI including her work building an assistive tool for a friend with ALS.
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In this live episode, host Nikita Roy sits down with Zach Seward, Editorial Director of AI Initiatives at The New York Times, recorded at the ONA x Newsroom Robots AI Leadership Summit in Detroit. With a background that spans journalism, product, and executive leadership, Zach brings a rare blend of newsroom insight and entrepreneurial thinking to the challenges of this AI era. Before joining the Times, he co-founded Quartz, where he served as editor-in-chief, CEO, and chief product officer, helping to pioneer digital-native journalism.
Now at The Times, he’s built a new editorial AI team from the ground up, experimenting with tooling, guiding newsroom adoption, and thinking through what comes next in how journalism is produced, distributed, and consumed.
Key topics include:
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When officials in Santa Clara County (home to Silicon Valley) publicly proclaimed they were not sharing data with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, they likely did not expect to be caught in a contradiction. Yet behind the scenes, those same officials had recently signed new contracts with the federal agency — a fact that might have remained hidden if not for a new generation of AI tools developed at Stanford University.
This breakthrough was made possible by Big Local News, a Stanford-based initiative using AI to help local journalists uncover stories hidden deep within public records. As local newsrooms grapple with shrinking resources and overwhelming amounts of data, tools like these are helping restore investigative capacity where it’s needed most.
In this episode of Newsroom Robots, Cheryl Phillips, founder and co-director of Big Local News at Stanford University, joins host Nikita Roy to share how her team is building AI-powered tools that support watchdog journalism and make complex data more accessible to reporters across the country.
Key topics include:
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When it comes to AI adoption, experimentation is easy—scaling is hard. So, what is the difference between AI projects that fade out and those that transform newsrooms? A strong infrastructure.
In this episode of Newsroom Robots, Kasper Lindskow, the head of AI at JP/Politikens Media Group joins host Nikita Roy. Kasper shares how as one of Denmark's largest media groups they are building a scalable AI infrastructure across multiple news brands, balancing technical innovation with editorial values.
Key topics include:
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Imagine a newsroom where AI agents assist with reporting, actively surface leads, analyze government data, and help journalists navigate complex investigations in real time. Norway’s iTromsø is laying the groundwork for exactly that.
In the second part of this episode with Rune Ytreberg, head of data journalism at iTromsø, and Lars Adrian Giske, head of AI join host Nikita Roy to share how their small but ambitious newsroom is systematically building an infrastructure for AI-powered journalism. This isn’t just about isolated tools—it’s about creating a cohesive ecosystem where AI enhances reporting at every level.
Rather than simply bolting AI onto existing workflows, iTromsø is focused on building a structured data infrastructure that supports AI agents across multiple newsroom functions.
Their vision includes:
This structured approach isn’t just about efficiency—it’s about creating a foundation where AI can play an active role in surfacing critical stories.
iTromsø is designing an AI-ready newsroom—one where structured data, automated insights, and AI-assisted research come together to elevate investigative journalism.
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Translating a journalist's gut instinct into code—is it possible? In Norway, iTromsø—a long-standing regional newspaper known for its investigative journalism and deep local coverage—has found a way.
Their AI system, DJINN (Data Journalism Interface for News Gathering and Notification), acts like an experienced beat reporter, scanning hundreds of municipal documents and surfacing the most newsworthy leads. The impact? In their first week using DJINN, summer interns fresh out of journalism school produced five front-page stories—on a beat that usually takes years to master.
In this episode of Newsroom Robots, Rune Ytreberg and Lars Adrian Giske join host Nikita Roy to talk about iTromsø’s structured approach to AI-driven reporting and how they built tools that strengthen their local journalism.
Rune leads iTromsø’s data journalism lab, where he has been developing AI-driven editorial solutions for 70 local newspapers within the Polaris Media Group since 2020. And Lars is the Head of AI at iTromsø and led the development of DJINN. Since its launch in 2023, 36 newspapers across Norway have adopted DJINN, sourcing documents from nearly half of all Norwegian municipalities.
Key topics include:
•How a small newsroom built AI tools to strengthen investigative journalism
•Why their AI systems are designed for specific beats like urban planning and fisheries, reducing hallucinations and increasing precision.
•Embedding editorial expertise in AI development
•How their fisheries database flagged irregularities and how their urban planning system transformed local accountability coverage.
This is just Part 1 of our deep dive into how iTromsø is using AI to power investigative reporting. In Part 2, Rune and Lars will discuss their latest project: AI-powered research assistants that will proactively surface investigative leads for their journalists.
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Neil Brown, president of The Poynter Institute and former chair of the Pulitzer Prizes, joins host Nikita Roy to discuss the Pulitzer Board's decision to require AI disclosure in prize submissions. In 2024, two Pulitzer Prize winners disclosed using AI in their work - City Bureau and Invisible Institute used machine learning to analyze police misconduct files for "Missing in Chicago," while The New York Times' visual investigations desk employed AI to identify bomb craters in Gaza. Of the 45 finalists that year, five had disclosed using AI in their submissions.
In this episode, Brown discusses how the Pulitzer Board approached AI disclosure requirements and shares his perspective on technology's evolving role in journalism.
Key topics include:
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Upasna Gautam, Senior Platform Product Manger at CNN and Chair of the Board of Directors at the News Product Alliance, joins host Nikita Roy to discuss her framework for AI integration in newsrooms.
In this episode, Gautam breaks down her three-question approach to AI implementation and shares insights from building CNN's content management platform Stellar. Through practical examples from CNN's journey and her work with newsrooms globally, Gautam offers a systematic framework for evaluating which AI opportunities are worth pursuing.
Key topics include:
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Agnes Stenbom, Sweden’s AI Person of the Year and Head of IN/LAB and Trust Initiatives at Schibsted Media, joins host Nikita Roy to discuss how one of the Nordic region’s largest media groups is innovating with AI to reach underrepresented audiences and build trust in journalism. Stenbom is also an industry doctoral candidate researching AI in journalism and a co-founder of Nordic AI Journalism, a network advocating for the responsible use of AI in journalism across the Nordic region.
In this episode, Stenbom highlights how Schibsted is leveraging AI to tackle news avoidance, experimenting with interactive formats, and navigating the challenges of responsible AI adoption in newsrooms.
Key topics include:
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Ritvvij Parrikh, Senior Director of Product at Times of India, joins host Nikita Roy to discuss how AI-powered personalization is transforming news distribution and why newsrooms need to rethink their approach to revenue optimization.
Parrikh, who leads product development at India's largest English-language news organization, discusses their innovative approach to news personalization that increased click-through rates by 85% on web and 40% on mobile. His team developed a proprietary recommendation system that automatically optimized content distribution for individual readers. As an industry thought leader, Parrikh has been instrumental in demonstrating how newsrooms can build AI systems that balance editorial judgment with reader preferences while maintaining journalistic integrity.
Key topics include:
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Martin Schori, Deputy Managing Editor and Associate Publisher at Aftonbladet, joins host Nikita Roy to discuss how Sweden’s largest newsroom built an AI hub, developing a wide range of innovative editorial tools, including a suite of AI-powered tools for the newsroom and a chatbot for the EU elections. As the Program Lead for the AI Hub, Schori shares the biggest wins, challenges, and key lessons from their experiments with AI in journalism.
Key topics include:
- The creation of Aftonbladet’s AI hub and its impact on editorial workflows
- How Aftonbladet used AI to engage readers with an EU election chatbot
- Analyzing coverage using AI to track gender and diversity representation
- Ethical considerations and maintaining editorial control with AI tools
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In this special episode of Newsroom Robots, host Nikita Roy steps into the spotlight to answer your pressing questions about AI. Recorded during a session with the Online News Association (ONA), this episode covers a range of topics, from ethical considerations in AI-generated content to practical tools that can elevate your work.
If you're interested in learning more about how AI is being implemented in newsrooms, sign up to receive a series of case studies on AI and journalism, researched and written by Nikita in collaboration with the Online News Association.
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Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), co-chair of the U.S. Congressional AI Caucus and one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people in AI, shares her perspective on the opportunities and risks of AI with host Nikita Roy.
With over three decades of experience in the U.S. House of Representatives representing parts of Silicon Valley, Rep. Eshoo has been a leading voice on technology and its implications. Her long-standing engagement with tech policy provides a unique perspective on the current AI revolution.
Key topics discussed in this episode include:
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Natali Helberger, Professor of Law and Digital Technology at the University of Amsterdam, joins host Nikita Roy to explore the complex ethical landscape of AI in journalism. In this conversation, they discuss everything from recommendation algorithms and filter bubbles to the EU AI Act and the future of responsible AI adoption in media.
Recognized as one of the "100 brilliant women in AI ethics" to follow worldwide, Helberger is also the co-founder of the AI Media and Democracy lab at the University of Amsterdam. Her research focuses on how AI and algorithms are transforming society and the media, with implications for law and governance. Helberger chairs the Council of Europe Expert Group on AI and Freedom of Expression and serves on the advisory board of the Reuters Institute for Journalism at Oxford. She regularly advises national and European policymakers, including the European Commission, European Parliament, and UNESCO.
Key topics include:
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