AI and the latest, most existential opportunity to lay down journalism’s role

Journalism has always had to play catch-up with technological advancement. The need to ride the next wave to reach more and newer audiences is an in-built capability and imperative for newsrooms.

But for more than a decade now, newsrooms have found themselves in a more acute and more consequential race in meeting the way news is defined, produced and consumed.

This was especially salient when social media emerged. Newsrooms responded to it with their natural impulse: Do more, make more, post more, boost more, do it faster, do it cheaper. If audience attention wavered, we looked for the next platform to conquer or the next piece of content that would find the perfect algorithmic balance of news, affirmation, entertainment or, for some, grievance.

We adapted by focusing on a relentless pursuit of scale: more articles, faster publishing cycles, new distribution channels and an endless array of digital metrics designed to measure engagement, clicks and page views.

Now, faced with a new disruption in the form of artificial intelligence, the impulse is the same, but the same playbook is not the answer.

We can and will continue to find means of reaching newer audiences in ways and at speeds which are demanded of us. But, with the knowledge that algorithms can aggregate text in milliseconds and that synthetic engines can generate basic summaries, rewrite press releases and churn out generic content much faster, and sometimes better, than we ever can, we need to do things differently.

If newsrooms treat news as a basic commodity, one whose main metric of success is production at speed, scale and low cost, journalists will inevitably be replaced by machines. At scale.

To the extent that many newsrooms are aware that the old responses are ill-suited to the new existential challenge, there is little consensus about what to do, both collectively and individually.

Some have decided to aggressively embrace AI not just to assist journalists but, in some cases, to replace them. Multiple companies have liberally published AI-generated content, with varying approaches on public declarations and accountability.

At the other end of the spectrum are those who take what we would call a progressive but cautious and considered stance on AI.

During a recent speech, New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger warned media leaders of the dangers of not standing up to Big Tech and how the industry needs to do more to do so.

“Our profession has been too quiet, too passive and too fragmented in the face of abuses by the companies leading the AI revolution,” Sulzberger said at the WAN-IFRA World News Media Congress in June. “We cannot allow AI cheerleaders to dominate the public conversation without interjecting to argue for the importance of ensuring a sustainable future for original journalism.”

While we may look with hope to key media leaders and governments to come together to create a set of common standards and guard rails, the more practical approach must be for individual newsrooms and journalists to do what we can now.

This World News Day, we must confront a fundamental truth: Our survival and relevance depend not on competing with or simply harnessing machines to achieve speed and scale, but on doing and explaining the very things AI can never do.

The trust imperative

This reckoning comes against a challenging global backdrop. Year after year, global studies paint a sobering picture of media consumption worldwide. In many mature democracies, overall trust in the news has drifted downwards.

Fortunately, some parts of the world seem to be holding the line. For now.

Singapore is one of them.

Trust in mainstream news institutions held at a comparatively high level, according to studies like the Reuters Institute Digital News Report and Edelman Trust Barometer. Where the Reuters Institute reports that the proportion of people who trust news has fallen to 37 per cent – the lowest the institute has ever recorded – it found that trust in The Straits Times and CNA hovers annually at just under 80 per cent.

Yet, high trust is not a permanent inheritance. ST is keenly aware that it must be earned anew every single day.

The integration of AI into public life introduces fresh uncertainties to this balance. Unchecked, automated content and deepfakes threaten to further pollute the information ecosystem, making audiences even more sceptical of what they read and see online.

Newsrooms worldwide are trying to figure out how technology can be harnessed responsibly without compromising the foundational trust of the communities they serve.

At ST, protecting this reservoir of high trust is our highest priority. We cannot afford to sit back and assume that past credibility will insulate us from future scepticism.

AI as a means to an end

How do we protect and build this trust?

First, we will be clear about what role AI will play in our newsroom. We know, for instance, that we are not an AI company and should not pretend to be one. Trust and serving the Singapore public are core pillars of ST’s mission, and we remind ourselves that those are our goals, not how much AI we use. We are a mission-, journalism- and human-centric newsroom. Not an AI-centric one.

We embrace AI to the extent that it helps us advance our mission, always keeping in mind what is actually important to us.

ST’s essential value lies in our human journalists. The responsibility of civic-mission journalism resides in holding a set of judgments: what is newsworthy, what is fair, what is true, what is contextual, what is representative and what is meaningful.

At a recent Singapore Press Club event, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office Indranee Rajah described the value of the human touch in journalism well.

“No algorithm can substitute for the years spent understanding a beat, building sources and learning how an industry or a policy actually works. A reporter who has covered the local healthcare system for a decade will ask a different question than one relying on a search engine,” she said.

“So let technology be your tool, and not your master. The power of the written word, the lyricism of a phrase, the crispness of a sentence, and the ability to inform, enlighten and to move hearts and minds should remain irrevocably in your hands.”

How we use AI therefore safeguards the judgment of journalists and editors. Technology should augment human journalism, not replace it.

The use of generative AI in ST’s newsroom must therefore begin with humans, with factual information vetted by our journalists.

We recently launched our AI policy across ST, underpinned by four key principles: human oversight; editorial accountability and responsibility; transparency and disclosure; and care for privacy and security. A summary of this policy will be available online.

This is just a start and is by no means the end of this public conversation we will have about AI and our work.

From reach to relationships, content to community

We cannot ignore the human element of building trust. Therefore, another imperative part of this process lies in a decisive strategic and cultural shift: Moving from reach to relationships, and from content to community.

For too long, modern media success has been defined by reach. How many unique visitors clicked on a link, or how widely a story went viral. But reach is passive and fleeting. It treats readers as eyeballs to be counted or ultimately monetised, rather than people to be engaged.

Public service journalism, in contrast, thrives on real, enduring relationships built on shared purpose and mutual respect.

Building these relationships requires us to look beyond just polished digital products, user interfaces and the next platform. Excellent design and smooth user experiences matter greatly, but they are the wrapper around journalism that involves real-world interactions which foster common spaces and protect common truths.

In a fragmented digital world where algorithms can isolate individuals into personalised echo chambers, news organisations must aspire to act as the civic glue that holds society together.

At ST, we will try to do this in three ways.

1. Accessibility and transparency

We want to be a newsroom whose journalists have the closest ears to the ground – and who are the most accessible and relatable to our community. Trust grows when people understand how news is gathered, are aware of how choices are made, and know who the journalists behind the bylines are.

To achieve this, we are committing to greater transparency in our reporting processes and expanding our footprint of face-to-face engagements. Through smaller, more intimate community dialogues and reader forums, we will create physical and digital spaces where readers in Singapore can speak directly to our editors and reporters. We want to hear your critiques, answer your questions and listen to the issues that keep you up at night. We have met many of you at these forums, and we will continue to meet more of you.

As we say this, we are aware that much of this conversation does not come naturally to us as journalists. We have never been comfortable talking about ourselves, telling our audiences (and competitors) what we are doing, or explaining our journalism. It goes against our instincts. But it is precisely at this moment that journalism must re-examine its instincts in the face of larger existential questions. It may give rise to new ways of thinking and foster closer collaboration between the newsroom and community.

2. A deeper community focus

AI can analyse national datasets at scale, but it cannot sit in a heartland coffee shop, sense the mood of a neighbourhood or understand the subtle cultural nuances of a housing estate undergoing redevelopment.

We are therefore devoting even more of our reporting resources towards reporting on our community, which will be defined widely and inclusively. We will uncover stories of quiet everyday heroes, local struggles and the bonds within neighbourhoods and smaller communities. These are the human stories that only human journalists can discover and articulate.

3. Engaging our readers in more ways

We are constantly trying new ways to engage and surprise our audiences, and we intend to double down on this effort.

For instance, in 2026, we launched a crossword with a distinctly Singapore flavour. We worked with the National Library Board on a series entirely original and handcrafted with clues that reflect our local culture.

We are also investing heavily in narrative journalism that captures the full texture of the human experience. Whether through evocative long-form writing, immersive photojournalism or compelling visual storytelling, our focus will be on work that illuminates complex realities. A machine can assemble facts, but it cannot feel empathy, exercise moral intuition or convey the deep emotional weight of a lived human experience.

Embracing technology without losing our soul

At ST, we will aim to put AI into the rightful context of our larger purpose of public service journalism.

AI can help our journalists analyse vast troves of public documents, translate research, streamline administrative tasks and personalise how content is delivered to readers with different needs. Used wisely, technology frees up our journalists from routines so they can spend more time doing actual reporting.

However, we will remain acutely mindful of the known and unknown dangers that technology presents. The impact of social media on people and our journalism is a case in point we must never forget.

The future of news will not and cannot be decided by who builds the cleverest algorithms or who publishes the most content the most quickly. It will be decided by who holds the trust of the public when the noise becomes deafening, or when common truths need to prevail.

On this World News Day, our commitment to our readers is this: We will not simply do more of the same. We will focus our energy and resources where they matter most – on being present in your lives, telling the stories that matter to your communities, and nurturing the human relationships that form the foundation of a cohesive, informed and resilient society.

It will not be easy, but our mission demands that we try.