Reporters at McClatchy Withhold Bylines in A.I. Dispute

Journalists at newspapers like The Miami Herald and The Sacramento Bee are refusing to let the chain use their names on summarized articles generated by a new A.I. tool.

McClatchy, the newspaper chain behind publications including The Sacramento Bee, The Miami Herald and The Idaho Statesman, has started to use a new artificial intelligence tool that can summarize traditional articles and spit out different versions for different audiences.

Its reporters aren’t happy about it.

Journalists in many of the company’s newsrooms are now withholding their bylines from articles created by the new tool, meaning that those articles will run with a generic credit rather than a reporter’s name, as is customary. They are also labeled A.I.-assisted.