Those books that the Chicago Sun-Times recommended reading this summer? You can stop looking for them.
The newspaper said Tuesday that several of the titles had been generated by AI and don’t actually exist.
“Heat Index: Your Guide to the Best of Summer,” published on Sunday, was created in part by a freelancer who works for a third-party company, according to the Sun-Times.
“To our great disappointment, that list was created through the use of an AI tool and recommended books that do not exist,” Melissa Bell, chief executive of Chicago Public Media, which runs the newspaper, said in a statement. “We are actively investigating the accuracy of other content in the special section.”
The AI flub comes as industries like journalism fear that the rapidly developing technology could encroach on jobs formerly occupied by humans.
The Sun-Times recently cut 20% of its staff, according to Axios.
While it has come a long way in recent years, AI is not a flawless technology and some iterations have been known to generate fictional or inaccurate information — an issue also called hallucinating. Some institutions have found uses for the growing technology, including the health care field, education and marketing. However, there is still much pushback from some consumers who are hesitant to trust AI.
And like all forms of journalism, AI still requires fact-checking.
While several of the books listed by the Sun-Times do not exist, the authors attributed with writing them do. There is no “Tidewater Dreams,” for example, but Isabel Allende is an acclaimed Chilean American writer. The Chicago author Rebecca Makkai is credited with the fake book “Boiling Point.” And author Min Jin Lee is listed as having written the nonexistent book “NightShade Market.”
Toward the bottom of the list, some real books appear, such as André Aciman’s “Call Me By Your Name.”
A spokesperson for the Sun-Times directed NBC News to Bell’s statement on the paper’s website.
Bell said the list came from distributor King Features, a company the paper regularly partners with for content.
“King Features worked with a freelancer who used an AI agent to help build out this special section. It was inserted into our paper without review from our editorial team, and we presented the section without any acknowledgement that it was from a third-party organization,” she said.
At least one other paper, The Philadelphia Inquirer, also used the third-party list including the AI-generated book titles.
In a statement shared by the Sun-Times, a spokesperson for King Features said the company has “a strict policy with our staff, cartoonists, columnists, and freelance writers against the use of AI to create content. The Heat Index summer supplement was created by a freelance content creator who used AI in its story development without disclosing the use of AI. We are terminating our relationship with this individual. We regret this incident and are working with the handful of publishing partners who acquired this supplement.”
The Sun-Times said it had removed the list from its digital publication, and the website had a banner on the homepage leading to Bell’s statement as of Wednesday afternoon. The paper will now identify in print when content comes from a third-party distributor, and is currently reviewing its relationship with third-party contractors to ensure they meet the standards of the newsroom, the statement says.
