Mi3 serves up a journalism disaster in 17 syllables

While Dr Mumbo fears he’s an old fuddy duddy, preferring humans to write his news, he’s nonetheless been watching Mi3’s AI-driven daily “Fast News” press release rewriting service with some interest.

Sadly the robots drove Mi3 off a cliff this morning, getting the wrong end of the stick about some of the complexities of the Southern Cross Austereo – Seven West Media merger.

This morning SCA informed the market that activist shareholder Sandon Capital is trying to force a shareholder vote on the matter. Because of the structure of the deal, only SWM shareholders will get a vote, as SCA will issue new stock.

Sandon is trying to force a change to the SCA constitution, demanding that shareholders should be consulted if the SCA board wants to issue more than 5% new stock.

However, as SCA informed the market, changing the constitution requires 75% shareholder approval. Two major shareholders – Spheria and Thorney Investments who own 29% of the company between them – will not be backing the Sandon move, meaning it will inevitably fall short of the 75% it needs.

Unfortunately, the Mi3 robot misunderstood, with today’s Mi3 Fast News email leading with the incorrect claim that the deal was facing a hiccup because Spheria and Thorney (actually very much in favour of the merger) are voting against.

There was also, as is Mi3’s wont, an (inaccurate) haiku to go with the article: “Shareholders oppose, Merger plans face resistance, Votes may not align.”

Although the article strays into the hallucination territory that AI is so fond of, there is a silver lining for readers. Could this be the first time in publishing history that somebody issues a correction to a haiku?