The LA Times Has ‘Moved On’ From AI-Driven Bias Meter After KKK Snafu

The AI-generated “bias meter” that the Los Angeles Times rolled out last month in its Voices section – and pulled the next day after it added that the KKK was not “an explicitly hate-driven movement” – is not likely to come off the bench, managing editor Hector Becerra said in a recent meeting.

In an April 4 Zoom meeting, shared to a blog for former Times staffers, Becerra said of the short-lived Insights feature, “Thank God there is no real bias meter … I can’t say that anybody was a huge fan of it. It’s a bit of a distraction, but I think people mostly moved on.”

On March 3, newspaper owner Patrick Soon-Shiong said that Insights would “offer readers an instantly accessible way to see a wide range of different AI-enabled perspectives alongside the positions presented in the article.” He also said, “I believe providing more varied viewpoints supports our journalistic mission and will help readers navigate the issues facing this nation.”

The following day, the feature was yanked after it added, in part, the note that the KKK was merely “responding to societal changes rather than an explicitly hate-driven movement” to Gustavo Arellano’s column.

Becerra explained in the April 4 meeting, “That citation did not defend the KKK. But it was written in such a passive kind of voice and almost, like, backwards, that I think some people misread it as almost being too soft. And then it got picked up by media: ‘AI defends KKK.'”

He added, “I have to be honest with you, that kind of pissed me off, because media, in general, we should be better than that. There is so much disinformation going on. Let’s be precise about what it actually said and what it actually did.”

As Arellano himself pointed out in a follow-up to his column on March 7, only part of what the AI had added was included in the news pick-ups.

“Local historical accounts occasionally frame the 1920s Klan as a product of ‘white Protestant culture’ responding to societal changes rather than an explicitly hate-driven movement, minimizing its ideological threat,” Arellano wrote, italicizing the last four words.

Arellano noted at the end of his March 7 article that he had earlier predicted that “whatever AI program the Los Angeles Times would end up using on its opinion pieces, it would self-immolate the moment it encountered one of mine.”

The Times and Hector Becerra did not respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.

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