Dr Mohamed Abdulzaher
Media Consultant at UAE Government Communication Office
This is a follow up to my writings on Artificial Intelligence Journalism and how the world can benefit from technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution which is creating a media industry revolution.
I talked before about how there are many technologies produced by that revolution, and how they can be greatly exploited within media organizations, whether through publishing new content, the provision of faster and more accessible tools to the public, or saving on the material cost of many media tools that are now considered expensive.
Today I am talking about “Blockchain” and how this modern technological tool can be used as a media tool in AI journalism. So what is blockchain technology?
A blockchain is a decentralized ledger of all transactions across a peer-to-peer network. Using this technology, participants can confirm transactions without a need for a central clearing authority. Potential applications can include fund transfers, settling trades, voting, and many other issues. Blockchain is the technology that enables the existence of cryptocurrency (among other things). Bitcoin is the name of the best-known cryptocurrency, the one for which blockchain technology was invented. A cryptocurrency is a medium of exchange, such as the US dollar, but is digital and uses encryption techniques to control the creation of monetary units and to verify the transfer of funds, according to PWC report.
Currently billions of dollars a year are invoiced to organizations for freight movement by truck, train, aircraft and ship. The freight bill audit and pay (FBA&P) process involves matching invoices against the services rendered prior to payment remittance.
Here’s how the Blockchain solution enabling works: Having a single shared source of previously agreed-upon information can ensure everyone is aligned on the rates and corresponding terms and conditions.
Being able to track the shipment in real time provides all parties with increased confidence in their goods and the ability to quickly react to any unexpected disruptions.
Primary organization no longer need to trust the accuracy of the shippers’ data or calculations, such as the number of miles travelled or time to complete the trip, as this data can be automatically gathered and shared with all parties on the blockchain. Using smart contracts and blockchain technology, the level of effort to audit invoices is greatly reduced. Many activities, such as reconciliation, are eliminated through having a single shared document, while others are automated through smart contracts calculating invoices based on agreed-upon rates and tracking data.
So with the Blockchain technology we ensure improvement in productivity and quality, Increasing transparency among parties and reinventing products and processes.
Blockchain and AI Journalism:
Blockchain will easily handle ad fraud techniques. A report from Juniper Research indicates that advertisers are likely to lose an estimated $ 44 billion by 2022 because of ad fraud.
Additionally, the research predicted that AI will be crucial analysing the vast amounts of data generated from advertising activities daily and minimising the losses due to ad fraud. The report predicted that fraudsters will increasingly innovate in their approaches to imitate genuine advertising activity including faked clicks, mouse movements and social network accounts.
The research predicted that platforms leveraging AI for targeting purposes will account for 74% of total online and mobile advertising spend by 2022. However, as the adoption of AI becomes saturated, only platforms demonstrating the most effective algorithms will be able to charge premium prices to advertisers.
Some large media players have already started the journey with blockchain. For example, in 2018, Comcast announced the Blockchain Insights Platform with NBC Universal, Disney, Channel 4 and others to match audience datasets — without sharing data — to better plan, target, execute and measure advertising. 4 In music, Spotify acquired the blockchain start up Mediachain Labs to work on developing better technology for connecting artists and other rights holders with the tracks hosted on Spotify’s service.
Blockchained-News vs Fake news:
Since the blockchain is maintained to remove the characteristic of infinite reproducibility from a digital asset, we can use it to mark the genuine and sourced news and info before publishing online and catch any fake content, as it’s in Blockchained-News.
Also the blockchain will be very effective in sharing the information and the content between sources and media to provide the audience with the right and trusted info and news, and to provide the Open Data portals with more Blockchained-News.