The use of AI to automate communication has become an increasingly mainstream activity, largely thanks to the popularity of ChatGPT. People have used the tool for a range of tasks, from editing text to generating code, raising a series of concerns about plagiarism, copyright and general accuracy.

In this presentation, Prof Loosen argue’s that these controversies ignore a more foundational transformation, which sees AI actively contributing to communication at a societal level. Working with colleagues in Germany, Prof Loosen has started to consider what it means to think about AI as a form of communication, working with and further developing the concept ‘Communicative AI’.

In this talk, Prof Loosen introduces this concept and illustrates the breadth and depth of this phenomenon through a series of case studies from the journalism sector. She will go on to discuss future research agendas that plan to address AI from this novel perspective, with consideration of some of the implications of understanding particular types of automation as communication.