Automatic analysis

Evidence is that news monitoring is becoming increasingly automated, largely as a result of the increasing amount of news available via the internet. Many acknowledge that traditional cuttings agencies are about 85% accurate and evidence is that about 75-80 percent of news is available via an online feed.

Is this drive for automation going to enter the news analysis market? Well, it already has and competitors like VMS have produced ‘artificial intelligence’ linguistic analysers to research both qualitative and quantitative elements.

In effect this is an attempt to provide an automated measurement tool for favourability and messaging (accepted elements of qualitative research). Neuendorf, the leading academic on content analysis, disagrees with their introduction and says the human contribution to content analysis is paramount.

I know from experience that accurate analysis is a delicate process and one which needs detailed consideration. I am sure that in the coming years this issue will become increasingly central and it will increasingly polarise research providers and research users. I wonder what the PR community think about them?