--- title: "Journalist Resigns After Being Exposed for Fake, AI-Generated Quotes" description: "A green journalist at Wyoming newspaper the Cody Enterprise resigned this month, after a competitor noticed awkward language in his articles." date: "2024-08-18" modified: "2024-08-18" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/journalist-ai-generated-quotes" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" tags: - "ai journalism" - "generative ai" - "the digest" --- # Journalist Resigns After Being Exposed for Fake, AI-Generated Quotes ![A green reporter at Wyoming newspaper the Cody Enterprise resigned this month, after a competitor noticed awkward language in his articles.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* ## Hack Job If you're going to use AI to write for you, and if you also happen to answer to an editor, don't. It's not just lazy, it's plain stupid, because a keen reader can always sniff out the BS. Case in point: Aaron Pelczar, a green reporter at Wyoming newspaper the *Cody Enterprise* tried to get away with using AI to do his job — and now he's out of one after a competitor exposed his fraud, [*The New York Times* reports](). Pelczar resigned on August 2, just two months after he started at the newspaper. Investigators discovered that he wasn't just using a large language model to write the body of his articles, but to fabricate entire direct quotes, too, an egregious lapse of journalistic integrity in the age of AI. "There were some weird patterns and phrases that were in his reporting," CJ Baker, a staff writer at rival local paper the *Powell Tribune* who [broke the story](), told the *NYT*. ## On the Scent Maybe a more conniving fraudster could've kept the charade up for longer. The fabricated quotes — which included those that claimed to be from government agencies and even the state's governor — read stiffly, and according to Baker, sounded more like the stuff put in news releases than what a person would say aloud. And the thing about quotes is that they're usually attributed to people. So Baker "went back and started checking on quotes that appeared in this reporter's stories that had not appeared in other publications or in press releases or elsewhere on the web," he told the *NYT*, and found seven that had never spoken to Pelczar. After Baker shared his findings with the *Cody Enterprise,* the paper launched an investigation, leading to Pelczar's resignation. *Cody Enterprise* editor Chris Bacon [issued an apology]() in the paper's editorial on Monday. "I apologize, reader, that AI was allowed to put words that were never spoken into stories," Bacon wrote. ## Automated Fakery Fraud [in journalism]() predates AI, but the technology's capabilities potentially make fake reporting easier and more tempting than ever. Because if there's anything chatbots are good at, it's quickly churning out large amounts of text and [confidently making up facts](). But the temptation doesn't just apply to individual reporters who are in over their heads: entire publications have deceptively leveraged large language models, too. Last year, for example, we caught Sports Illustrated [publishing entire AI-generated product reviews]() under fake bylines. Understandably, AI's place in the newsroom [remains a fraught topic](). Beyond the [existential threat]() it poses to the industry, its use could also undermine the reputation of publications. "There's just no way that these tools can replace journalists," Alex Mahadevan at the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank, told the *NYT*. "But in terms of maintaining the trust with the audience, it's about transparency." **More on AI:** *[The Atlantic's Staff Is Furious About Its Deal With OpenAI]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()