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ChatGPT and the 2024 US election
2024 will be the first US presidential election in the age of generative AI. How worried should we be about the spread of misinformation and its implications for democracy?
In 2016, social media platforms became Petri dishes of disinformation as foreign actors and far-right activists spread fake stories and worked to heighten partisan divisions. The 2020 election was fraught with conspiracy theories and baseless claims about voter fraud.
As 2024 approaches, tech and media experts warn that new generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney have the potential to spread misinformation and disinformation faster and easier than ever before. And this comes as newsrooms are experiencing mass layoffs and trusted systems like Twitter’s verification process become further eroded.
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, Media experts Brian Stelter and Nicole Hemmer says the stakes are incredibly high for truth and democracy.
“I think AI is going to make it easier to have a lot more information pollution in the atmosphere,” Stelter warns.
But Hemmer says there may be a light at the end of the tunnel. “I think that people don’t want to be post-truth,” she argues, “So maybe that’s where we’ll see those green shoots as people innovate ways to make it easier to navigate a world that’s awash in this kind of disinformation.”
Watch this episode of GZERO World with Ian Bremmer: "Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation"
Watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
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Was CNN's Town Hall with Trump a mistake?
"The media is not the enemy. The media is the people. And yet that messaging's gone so awry." Media journalist and former CNN host Brian Stelter expresses such a basic thought in the latest episode of GZERO World, and yet it's one about which so many Americans disagree. Stelter joined media historian Nicole Hemmer for a special panel interview on the current state of our hyper-fragmented media landscape and to look ahead at how news outlets can recapture voters' trust ahead of the 2023 election.
A big part of that mission, says Stelter, is to do more listening. "We need to hear so much more from voters and, frankly, so much less from these politicians that are pandering to them."
Watch this episode of GZERO World with Ian Bremmer: "Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation"
Watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
When did people stop trusting the media?
There was a time, not so long ago, when people trusted the media, and not just their specific corners of it. Walter Cronkite. Edward R. Murrow. Dan Rather. These were people all Americans relied on to understand the world, and they did so without suspicion. Today, we live in a different reality (or multiple realities, in fact). But according to media historian Nicole Hemmer, the war on trust began decades ago.
Starting back in the 1970s, Hemmer says, "...it was advantageous to the Republican Party to try to create an alternative to the mainstream media, an alternative to the Walter Cronkites...We see that with Fox News in the '90s, but also with the rise of talk radio, and then to some extent, the rise of alternative social networks that's happening now."
Hemmer joined media journalist and former CNN host Brian Stelter on a special panel interview for GZERO World with Ian Bremmer. The two discussed how the hyper-fragmented media landscape in which we find ourself has actually been decades in the making. And they look ahead to the 2024 election and consider how media companies can rebuild trust with Americans during such a crucial time for democracy.
Watch this episode of GZERO World with Ian Bremmer: "Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation"
Watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation
Ahead of the 2024 US presidential election, GZERO World takes a hard look at the media’s impact on politics and democracy itself.
In 1964, philosopher Marshall McLuhan coined the phrase, “the media is the message.” He meant that the way content is delivered can be more powerful than the content itself.
A lot’s changed since 1964, but the problem has only gotten worse. The ‘80s and ‘90s saw the rise of a 24/7 cable news cycle and hyper-partisan radio talk shows. The 21st century has thus far given us podcasts, political influencers, and the endless doom scroll of social media. And now, we’re entering the age of generative AI.
All of this has created the perfect ecosystem for information––and disinformation––overload. But there might be a bright spot at the end of the tunnel. In the world where it’s getting harder and harder to tell fact from fiction, news organizations, credible journalists, and fact-checkers will be more important than ever.
How has media changed our idea of truth and reality? And how can we better prepare ourselves for the onslaught of misinformation and disinformation that is almost certain to spread online as the 2024 US presidential election gets closer? Can trust in American’s so-called “Fourth Estate” be restored?
Ian Bremmer sits down with journalist and former CNN host Brian Stelter and Nicole Hemmer, a Vanderbilt University professor specializing in political history and partisan media.
Watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
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Podcast: The past, present and future of political media
Listen: Trust in journalism is rapidly eroding. At the same time, partisanship is skyrocketing.
Ahead of the 2024 US election, the GZERO World Podcast takes a look at the media’s role in politics and democracy itself. What lessons has the press learned since 2020 and how will the first election in the age of generative AI play out? Donald Trump’s presidency and role in contesting the 2020 election was a unique challenge for journalists. How do you reliably cover the US president and leader of the free world while he regularly repeats misinformation? And how to you challenge a politician whose entire brand is premised on the idea he’s being attacked by the press?
There's also the issue of covering some of the more extreme elements in both political parties. Politicians like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. traffic in conspiracy theories and often, outright lies. But they have a growing constellation of media platforms, from NewsMax to Joe Rogan, to reach an increasingly fragmented audience distrustful of mainstream news sources.
What lessons did journalists and the media take away from 2016 and 2020? And how will generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney impact the upcoming US presidential election in 2024?
Media experts Brian Stelter, journalist and former CNN anchor, as well as Nicole Hemmer, a political historian specializing in partisan media break down the current media landscape in a conversation with host Ian Bremmer.
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published.