Radical change
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Arena Group, owner of Sports Illustrated, has made a radical change in the world of media and publishing, sacking CEO Ross Levinsohn as part of a wide-ranging reshuffle of its management team after a scandal linked to the use of artificial intelligence in the creation of content for Sports Illustrated.
High-profile redundancies
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This announcement comes on the heels of several high-profile redundancies in the company's management ranks.
Scandal hard to ignore
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Although Arena Group has issued a statement highlighting the board's decision to sack Levinsohn as part of an overall strategy to boost operational efficiency and increase revenues, it's hard to ignore the scandal in which the company has been embroiled.
A shocking revelation
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It was revealed that the company had published articles whose content was generated by artificial intelligence, even though it claimed that this content was published by a real author.
Fake people
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What's more, the biographies and names of the alleged authors did not correspond to real people, but to fake people, whose photos and profiles were artificially generated, and this information was of course kept secret.
Futurism
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The controversy erupted when Futurism contacted Sports Illustrated with questions about AI-generated author profiles, which were promptly removed.
Who's telling the truth?
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Arena Group defended itself, claiming that the articles in question were licensed content obtained from AdVon Commerce, which guaranteed that all content had been written and edited by authors using legitimate pen names.
Many changes
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Several company executives have since been dismissed, including Rob Barrett, president of media and Julie Fenster, the company's general counsel, and finally CEO Ross Levinsohn.
A direct link?
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The company has not yet officially established a direct link between these firings and the fake authorship scandal.