AI coverage often includes cases where journalists publish avoidable errors caused by hallucinated or misattributed AI-generated quotes. A reported example involves a book containing multiple quotes that appear manufactured, mangled, or misattributed by AI. Corrections have also been issued for imaginary quotes attributed to public figures. The risk is reduced when writers do not paste chatbot responses directly into drafts and instead verify any quote by tracing it back to a reliable source. Avoiding cut-and-paste behavior can prevent AI-related embarrassment, but such mistakes may continue to occur as temptation to use generated text persists.
"On May 19, for example, Benjamin Mullin of The New York Times reported that The Future of Truth: How AI Reshapes Reality, a new book by Steven Rosenbaum, executive director of the Sustainable Media Center (and a Fast Company contributor), contained at least five quotes that appeared to have been manufactured, mangled, or misattributed by AI."
"Rosenbaum, who told Mullin he took "full responsibility" for the errors, is hardly the only writer to let hallucinated sound bites slip into their work. Earlier in May, The Times itself issued a correction for an article that had attributed an imaginary quote to a Canadian politician."
"In this case, I'm confident the answer is no, for the simple reason that I never insert anything from a chatbot's response directly into a story draft. Had a chatbot offered up a punchy quote from reporter/podcaster Kara Swisher -as one apparently did for Rosenbaum-I wouldn't have assumed it was real unless I could trace it back to its source. That's what I might quote."
"If every journalist resisted the temptation to cut and paste algorithmically generated text, far fewer of them would have AI blow up in their faces, Wile E. Coyote-style. But I don't expect the self-owns to dwindle anytime soon. Indeed, they may proliferate a"
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