From the Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Missouri School of Journalism comes RJI Momentum, a series of conversations with news industry thought leaders about strategies and services that can help newsrooms navigate the ever-changing world of technology and audience behavior. In the first season, RJI Executive Director Randy Picht chats with his guests about generative AI from three different newsroom perspectives.

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Building an AI foundation for your newsroom

Jon Accarrino, a veteran news marketer and founder/CEO of AI-focused consultancy Ordo Digital, lays out the top priorities for news organizations looking to meaningfully incorporate AI. From the controversial frontier of AI-generated images to the importance of defending against invasive data scrapers, he discusses the strategies that can keep newsrooms ahead of the curve.

Watching the AI agents and bots

Gavin King, founder of AI agent and bot traffic analytics platform Known Agents, argues that news organizations must confront the reality that bots constitute half of all web traffic. That presents challenges, but it also represents an enormous opportunity to track and monetize these robot visitors.

It’s all about the original content

Gray Media news executive and experienced anchor/reporter Lee Zurik knows the power of AI as an investigative tool and time-saving asset in broadcast news. But for Zurik, content differentiation in a news ecosystem dominated by AI-driven search traffic is just as important.