Techmeme: Robots Not Enough, Need Human Labor

Yesterday Techmeme founder, Gabe Rivera, admitted what we all knew already: you can’t always get robots to do the dirty work for you.

Rivera announced today that the company would be bringing on Megan McCarthy on board to help edit the news so they can avoid another Anna Nicole Smith incident*.

In a blog post titled “Guess what? Automated news doesn’t quite work” he explains how humans can’t find and organize news fast enough but computers will eventually screw something up. Rivera said in the beginning he focused on algorithmic development, however, as the automation reached a certain degree of maturity, the company realized a little bit of editing could go a long way to improve news results. Gabe admitted there has always been some implicit human editing but said that explicit editing will mean a better mix of headlines on Techmeme.

The new Techmeme will see Megan McCarthy take on a bunch of editorial duties, the main one being shifting things around; dead stories will be buried, breaking news will be more prominent. The company will also launch a new email address, editorial@techmeme.com. Rivera assures us that while all emails will be read, pretty much none of them will get a reply.

Click here to read the full post.

*Last year WeSmirch showed “Anna Nicole Smith Rushed to Hospital” when the woman had already died.

P.S. Megan McCarthy is a fox.