WaPo publishes story built on the work of a new AI tool called Haystacker
The Washington Post on Sunday published its first-ever story built on the work of a new AI tool called Haystacker that allows journalists to sift through large data sets — video, photo or text — to find newsworthy trends or patterns, reports Axios.
According to Axios author Sara Fischer, in an interview, the Post’s chief technology officer Vineet Khosla said the company is committed to building many AI tools in-house because they can address the specific needs of trained journalists. “It’s a far superior product than just the general purpose stuff you get from Big Tech,” he said.
That ethos, adds Fischer, “is reminiscent of the Post’s efforts to build an in-house content management system nearly a decade ago called ArcXP that serves the special needs of news publishers.”
Asked whether the Post would ever license Haystacker to other newsrooms, Khosla said that’s not the company’s focus right now. But, he added, “I’m pretty sure this, or some variation of it, is going to make it back to the industry at large. … There is no intention of keeping it just for us.”
Haystacker was built by the Post’s engineering team in conjunction with its newsroom. The tool took more than a year to build,
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