Author: Wang Jianhua (Professor, School of Journalism, Communication University of China);Su Riguga (Ph.D. candidate, School of Television, Communication University of China).
*: Young Journalists, Issue 19, 2023.
Introduction: Based on the mainstream digital and intelligent journalism practice, this paper analyzes from three dimensions: production remodeling, narrative innovation and value guidance, and provides theoretical reference for the mainstream journalism practice.
In the context of the all-round transformation of society driven by big data and intelligent technology, the logic of digital intelligence has been deeply embedded in the mainstream news production activities. "Accelerate the pace of integration and build a number of new mainstream with strong influence and competitiveness as soon as possible**"1] has become the goal of integration and transformation, and the mode of news production, concepts and their influencing factors have also changed. Based on the mainstream digital and intelligent news practice, this paper analyzes from three dimensions: production remodeling, narrative innovation and value guidance, and provides theoretical reference for mainstream news practice.
Production Remodeling: Digitalization, intelligence, and platformization of news production.
1) Digitization of news gathering and editing.
In the past, the acquisition of news clues mainly relied on the news sensitivity of reporters and editors and their accurate grasp of social hot spots. In addition, weather conditions and geospatial feasibility have become influencing factors in the news gathering process, which makes it difficult to ensure the timeliness of news. Today, with the help of digital technology, the ** of news leads is increasingly relying on "computational news discovery", that is, "the use of algorithms to direct editorial attention to potentially newsworthy events or information before publication"[2]. The collection of news and information is increasingly relying on digital technology, and when the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China is held, ** Radio and Television Station launched a series of reports on "Decoding the Decade" (2022), which takes the historic changes and achievements of the party and the country in the past ten years as the main content, combined with the reporting method of "satellite perspective + big data investigation + news story", showing a multi-dimensional, cute and respectable image of China. This is the first time that a variety of technologies such as satellite remote sensing, aerial surveying and mapping, and high-quality digital modeling of real-world scenes have been used in news reporting. China Youth Daily integrates "naked-eye 3D" and first-class technology to show the ten-year memory of China's innovation and development in a "three-dimensional" way. [3] During the two sessions of the National People's Congress in 2023, the first radio and television station launched the super ** anchor "AI Crown" in the ""Crown" and the digital real-time synthesis program "Long Yang Says the Two Sessions", which attracted attention, showing the virtualization and digital advantages of news gathering and editing under the empowerment of technology. What is more noteworthy is that digital intelligence promotes the adjustment of the production mechanism represented by MGC, "data algorithms accurately capture content, artificial intelligence robots participate in material collection, editing, and entry, and human-computer interaction completes the digital analysis of user portraits, providing personalized experience and services for the audience" [4], which makes news collection, editing and distribution integrated, and news production more flexible and intelligent.
2) Intelligent news review.
In traditional news production, news editors rely on professional concepts and norms to conduct corresponding content security audits, and have a decisive say in the production and distribution of news content. However, in the digital age of information overload, the mass and diversification of the number and form of news make simple manual review no longer suitable for complex communication scenarios. Especially for ** news, it is necessary to intervene and review from a multi-modal perspective such as text, images, audio, etc., far beyond the scope of traditional text review work. Therefore, the review process of "intelligence first, manual second" has become a common model for today's leading organizations, so as to provide dual content security in the editing and review process. Among them, the intelligent error correction function can establish a variety of custom rule bases, combined with deep language model analysis, to comprehensively check, proofread, identify and correct typos in the text, and then assist news editors. Intelligent audit can detect faces, scenes, objects and sensitive information in the news, including two levels: one is quality audit, which needs to check whether there are typos in the text, as well as the stability, clarity, professionalism, etc.;The second is content moderation, which pays more attention to the identification and detection of sensitive people and inappropriate remarks. To a certain extent, this makes up for the lack of manual review and helps to improve the accuracy and speed of news production and review.
3) ** Platform for the construction of resource pool.
At present, the digital intelligence demand of the news industry has been transformed from the previous single-point business capability to the full-process business capability, and how to accelerate the pace of integration and accelerate the digital and intelligent transformation of news production and dissemination is an urgent problem to be solved. From the perspective of the new 5G platform "Central" created by the first radio and television station, its overall operation is based on the intelligent **AI middle platform, and the intelligent technology runs through the whole business scenarios such as "collection, editing, storage, management and distribution", and comprehensively optimizes the production, management and consumption of media assets in the radio and television industry. For example, in the construction of media database, the uploaded news can be classified through text, audio recognition algorithms and text, image, and face tag algorithms, which improves the efficiency of content retrieval, positioning, acquisition and review, and provides a data basis for content operation, multi-modal search and personalized news recommendation. In addition, intelligent cataloging can improve the efficiency of news output. Structural analysis of ** content is carried out with four types of cataloging, including program layer, fragment layer, scene layer and lens layer, and the cataloging output standard is standardized, which can improve business efficiency and meet the needs of platform operation, news production and distribution recommendation. These functions fully reflect the importance of digital intelligence technology for the digital and intelligent transformation of mainstream news production and the entire industry.
Narrative innovation: emotional, gamified and scenicized journalism.
1) Emotional narrative constructs space of meaning.
The transformation of the news ecology has gradually transformed the traditional concept of "audience" into "user", and the concept of "user-centered" and the emotional tendency and acceptance of users when receiving news have become important indicators to measure the success of news. "Emotion has always played a role in the process of news production, as a central element in shaping the narrative and presentation strategy of news. [5] Compared with other platforms, the mainstream ** has a relatively balanced grasp of the "value of traffic" and "value of traffic", and how to generate emotional resonance with the receiver in the communication process and achieve empathy communication is the key issue considered in its news production.
The mainstream emotional narrative pays more attention to vertical connection, "taking the 'past' as an important narrative resource, and connecting with the present through three modes: inheritance and continuation, experience reference, and contrast"[6], to construct a cross-time and space-time media meaning space. It is especially used in news reports on major themes or news reports on sudden crisis events. On the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Douyin account "Zhong**" once released a short ** of the military parade ceremony "The collection of Tiananmen Square military parades over the years is here!".2019 The 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People's Republic of China, what are your expectations?》。With a time span of 70 years, the Tiananmen Square military parade since the founding of the People's Republic of China is compared, and the image of China that has gradually become stronger is set off in a visual way, so as to have emotional resonance with the public, and then strengthen the sense of national community, as of September 1, 2023, the number of likes has reached 650,000, with more than 3,000 comments and comments. [7] **Radio and Television Station's "News Network" column Douyin account set up a special topic of "Crossed, Simulcast"**, by revisiting the "famous scenes of the previous Spring Festival Gala" and telling the development process of "New Year's Flavor" and other topics to set off a series of changes at the moment. The feature adopts the method of cross-time and space media memory construction that compares with past news, leading the public to obtain a clearer and deeper understanding of the era in which they live, and the emotional resonance is also stronger. Under the backdrop of big data, the "past" plays a very important role as a narrative resource in the process of emotionalizing news and optimizing the effect of empathy communication.
2) Gamified storytelling promotes interactive behavior.
The mainstream news narrative is not limited to text and text, but is more presented in the form of interactive narratives such as gamification and participatory news. "Gamification of news is a historical manifestation of the attributes of news games, and it is also an important trend in the transformation of journalism in the digital age. [8] News games came into being when the gamification of news gradually changed from the use of ideas and symbols to concrete news products. For news games, news is the ontology of communication, and games are narrative methods. News games usually "use H5 as the carrying platform, with simple mechanism design, strong shareability and dissemination, high information arrival rate, and a combination of modules, audio, and animation to mobilize the audience's all-round sensory experience" [9]. Its ultimate purpose is to transfer part of the narrative power to the public, so that it can participate in the process of meaning construction, open up the meaning of intention, text meaning and interpretation meaning, and promote the interaction between the mainstream ** and the public, so as to improve the effectiveness of digital and intelligent communication.
From "70 Fuxing Avenue" (2019) 2D animation and full-sheet ** compositing, to "56 national costumes to choose from!".Show off your patriotic style (2019) real-life avatar and real-life suit, and then to the Beijing Winter Olympics mini-program "I Am an Ice and Snow Master" (2022) dynamic ** synthesis, the gamification characteristics of people's news narrative are becoming more and more obvious, and the interactivity and participation are deepening. CCTV and Douyin jointly created the news work "Growing Flowers All the Way in the Past Ten Years" (2022) using AI face swapping technology, users can feel 5 new era roles such as astronauts, online bloggers, and dancers after uploading**, and immerse themselves in the important moments and changes in China in the past ten years in the form of interactive games. With the continuous development and application of intelligent technologies such as VR and XR, the consideration of the interactive factors integrating digital intelligence technology in mainstream news works in the future is bound to go further, and it is committed to stimulating the endogenous power of news in the form of interactive narrative gamification.
3) Scenario-based storytelling enhances the immersive experience.
In the process of development from traditional to digital intelligence, the journalism industry has roughly gone through the stage of "commodity-led, service-led, and scenario-led". In the period of commodity dominance, news is a tangible resource, the audience is consumers, the boundary is clear, and the subject and object are clear. The mission is to produce and disseminate news from a professional point of view. With the popularization of the Internet, mobile devices and commercial communication platforms, the subjectivity of the audience has been significantly improved, and the logic of news production has shifted from commodity-oriented to service-oriented. **It not only undertakes the function of transmitting information, but also connects the intermediary of multiple subjects in society, so that the public can actively participate in public affairs, and has social and service attributes. When digital intelligence technology is more deeply applied to the journalism industry, scenario-based thinking is particularly important. In this context, the mainstream ** digital intelligence technology to improve the sense of scene of news and enhance the user's news experience has become the focus and difficulty that needs to be broken.
The advantage of digital intelligence is that virtual news scenes can be generated through AI, digital ** and other technologies to enhance users' immersive perception of space. For example, on the eve of May Fourth Youth Day in 2021, Xinhua News Agency, together with multiple departments, jointly launched "The Old ** Will "Speak"!"Traveling" through time and space to meet TA. The news work uses three AI technologies: restoration, coloring, and action-driven, allowing 16 historical celebrities to "travel through time and space" and "chat" with young people with their youthful insights to answer questions and solve doubts, effectively enhancing the recognition of Xinhua News Agency among online youth groups. During the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, the first radio and television station launched the world's first 5G+8K ultra-high-definition full-service broadcast vehicle to achieve long-term stable transmission of ultra-high-definition signals, with the "time slicing" and "bullet time" technologies of the "Cheetah system", the wonderful opening ceremony and the competition scene were presented in front of the public, bringing an immersive audio-visual feast of competition, culture and technology. It can be seen that digital intelligence technology has a great future in helping the mainstream ** create an immersive experience and improve the sense of scene of news narrative.
Value guidance: concretization, matrixing, and algorithmization of news dissemination.
1) Concretely present the connotation of mainstream values.
The attention to digital intelligence should not stop at the level of production and narrative, but also pay attention to how digital intelligence can assist the mainstream in the context of "public noise" to "raise the volume" and enhance the guidance and influence of mainstream values. In the process of interaction and influence of pluralistic social values, the mainstream has always been an important carrier and platform for disseminating mainstream values, and its concrete, matrix and algorithmic news presentation plays an important role in creating a mainstream value system.
At present, the concrete and personalized narratives of mainstream news reports are becoming more and more prominent. Concrete narrative emphasizes the deconstruction of grand narratives into independent and warm character stories, using emotions as a bridge of communication, and shaping the public's cognition and attitude towards specific issues in a small way. This kind of solo portrait depiction is different from the group portrait reporting method, which pays more attention to the closeness and emotion of the news, and closes the relationship between the news and micro individuals through emotional embedding, so as to optimize the effect of empathy communication. It can be seen from the China Journalism Award-winning works such as "Clear Love, Only for China" and "50 Years, Look at China's Answer Sheet" that the mode of expressing big themes with small incisions and combining concrete narratives with grand narratives is more conducive to raising the temperature of news and opening up the emotional space between ** and individuals. In the same way, personified storytelling is also an effective way to reinforce mainstream values. In mainstream news production, emotional images are usually constructed with the help of perceptible personified symbols, and emotional connection with the public is generated. For example, during the two sessions of the National People's Congress in 2023, ** Radio and Television Station will launch the super ** anchor "AI Crown" in the program ""Crown" and the Two Sessions", introducing the main topics of the two sessions through the dialogue between the real host and the super ** host. This kind of personified interactive narrative helps to eliminate the sense of distance between the mainstream** and the public, thereby improving the dissemination of mainstream values.
2) Matrix dissemination of the mainstream value system.
For the mainstream, the production of politically correct high-quality and fresh news works is the confidence for the mainstream value to "break the circle" and disseminate. However, on this basis, broadening the breadth of news communication and strengthening value leadership rely on the matrix communication of the whole platform.
From the perspective of actual news production and dissemination, most of the mainstream media have formed a distinctive full-scale communication matrix. Since 2021, Xinhua News Agency has coordinated and led the transformation and upgrading of the all-media platform for internal reporting and the integration of international communication, forming a full-scale communication system of "two micro + one end + multi-number". At the same time, it actively explores the innovative application of digital intelligence technology in editorial business and news reporting, and launches a series of high-quality integrated reporting products. Radio and Television Group is committed to "transforming from traditional radio and television to a world-class original video and audio production and distribution organization, from the traditional program production and broadcasting model to deepening the structural reform of the supply side of content production, and from the traditional technology layout to the '5G + 4K 8K + AI' strategic pattern change" [10], continuously strengthening technological innovation, actively promoting the construction of a digital and intelligent communication system, building a new 5G flagship cluster based on CCTV, CCTV news and cloud listening, and adopting "''Big Middle Station +The design concept of the small front desk creates a new platform for intelligent technology support" [11], and builds a digital intelligence communication system covering the whole production process of data collection and processing. The digital intelligence and matrix communication system are particularly outstanding in large-scale sports events. In the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, the first radio and television station gave full play to the advantages of the platform and resources, taking into account the audience groups at home and abroad, and successively launched works such as "Winter Olympics Big Coffee Talk", "Ice and Snow Star Wish", "Decoding the Winter Olympics with Technology", "My Winter Olympics Story", etc., to tell the real Olympic story, convey the Olympic spirit, and fully demonstrate the value and influence of the main station as a national mainstream.
3) Algorithmic strengthens the ability to guide value.
Personalized algorithm recommendation has a significant effect in commercial communication platforms, but it also leads to problems such as "traffic is king", "information cocoon", and "vulgarization and homogenization of content". On January 25, 2019, the general secretary of the Communist Party of China made it clear at the twelfth collective study of the Politburo that "the mainstream value orientation should be used to control the 'algorithm' and comprehensively improve the guidance ability" [12]. This shows that in the era of digital intelligence, the responsibilities and missions of the mainstream ** at the level of value guidance are more arduous: on the one hand, it is necessary to maintain the authenticity and objectivity of its own news production and dissemination, continue to provide high-quality news works, and play a corrective role in the current algorithmic anxiety;On the other hand, it is necessary to appropriately draw on the algorithm recommendation mechanism of commercial communication platforms, and combine their own particularities to form a mainstream algorithm composed of multiple value orientations. In particular, the mainstream should give mainstream values guidance in personalized intelligent algorithm recommendations, create a diversified content supply-side ecology, alleviate algorithm anxiety, and carry out positive mainstream content, value and cultural guidance.
"Mainstream algorithms" or "party media algorithms" not only give the news industry the correct direction in terms of top-level design, but also rely on AI technology to establish a human-machine content gatekeeping mechanism to ensure the authenticity of information and improve the coverage of mainstream ideologies. In 2021, Radio and Television took the lead in applying mainstream algorithms to its new flagship "Central", using the three coordinate axes of mainstream value, artistic value, and commercial value as a reference system to form an overall scheme composed of four parts: engine system, algorithm workbench, algorithm testing system and knowledge structure0、v1.1、v1.2 to v1After the upgrade iteration of 3, a relatively mature operation mechanism is formed to realize the availability, management and controllability of the main station algorithm. [13] The people's ** mainly helps the realization of mainstream value dissemination through six algorithm systems, including "business data center, content labeling system, content filtering and review system, user analysis system, precise distribution system, and detection and feedback system" [14], and further strengthens the machine reasoning ability by establishing a knowledge graph system, realizing the recommendation effect of content from point-to-point to cross-domain presentation, and forming a unique "party media algorithm".
Conclusion. **In the process of deep integration, digital intelligence technology reshapes news production, emotional interaction promotes narrative innovation, and "party media algorithm" strengthens value guidance are prominent integration paradigms and strategies. In the future, how to further enhance the "visibility" and authority of the mainstream in cyberspace, and strengthen the guiding power and influence of the mainstream, need to continue to explore in the practice of digital intelligence.
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This article refers to the citation format:
Wang Jianhua, Su Riguga. Production, Narrative and Value: The Transformation and Practice of Digital Intelligence in the Mainstream **[J].Young Journalists, 2023(19): 18-20+26