Beep boop. Google's new 'text to podcast' creation

And why these podcasts might be better for my mental health in the long run (election edition)

With the American election upon us, I’ve found myself reflecting on the news and how I access it. Or rather *don’t* access it.

In the last twelve months, I’ve actively taken a step back from trying to stay abreast about current politics to better protect my sanity.

As probably with many others…

… I’ve found most news outlets to be way too bias. Too much about the clicks rather than the top-ics (aka spreading awareness).

It’s gross - I hate it - I want to be more involved rather than passively sitting on the sidelines and avoiding the hard stuff - but my mental capacity to be controlled by explosive titles or a spicy algorithm has dwindled.

This has left me unsure how best to move forward educated but not exhausted.

CUE TO Google’s new product, Illuminate, which can “transform your content into engaging AI-generated audio discussions” LIKE A PODCAST.

This tool can literally summarize complex topics - like scientific papers - and then build out a podcast WITH PODCASTER VOICES! WHO HAVE INFLECTIONS! to discuss whatever the content is about.

What. the. ef.

My partner was listening to one of these podcasts earlier today and I had to leave the room from a mixture of shock / fear / needing to go get my coffee that was ready. The idea that this tool now exists might mean a bit more to me since, in my previous life, I produced podcasts, thus my livelihood revolved around content/production, and now Illuminate is just showing up like the new hot girl in town.

But really - what is the next step for this tool?

Could we extrapolate it to focus on global news? News without the human bias?

… AI does have it’s own bias though :/

One huge pro is the turnaround time for a podcast would be much quicker with AI curating the content. Where would the AI pull the information from though? Would it be biased as well and just become a cluster circle jerk of what I was trying to originally avoid with getting biased news?

And what about the emotional pieces? Could we keep the human connection stories to the human podcasters/writers? OR could we prompt the AI podcaster/curator to be more empathetic? Eek - where does it end??!

To sum up, something is broken right now with our news systems. The threat of everything being “fake news” is dumb. But I also don’t want to have my head in the sand for the rest of my life.

Help me, *AI* … you’re my only hope

Or maybe, just maybe, there’s a middle ground somewhere. One that keeps us informed without feeding into endless bias. Time will tell. And until then, fingers crossed we survive this election and go on to discuss this problem tomorrow.