Pursuing the Promises of Personalisation: Fetish and Friction in Futures of Automated News

This chapter explores the increasing automation of news production and distribution, particularly in relation to personalised news. The core argument is that automation technologies should be seen as drivers of sociotechnical change within news organisations, driven by the promises associated with personalisation, as well as how the anticipated promise and supposed magic of AI can obscure the adaptive process and its implications. The chapter presents an empirical inquiry into Nordic newsrooms, examining how they pursue the promise of personalised news. The concept of‘fetishisation’ is used to analyse how visions of a personalised future of news are imbued with promise and how that redistributes agency as the fetishised objects changes hands. The analysis highlights the performative effects of fetishising personalised futures and how it induces new forms of knowledge asymmetries, changes invalorisation of work and the exclusion of certain actors or perspectives. These implications become clear during moments of friction, which are generally brushed overwith the argument of making the technology work. Ultimately, the chapter offers acritical perspective on automated futures by illustrating the inseparability of automation from its interactions with organisations and discourses and emphasises the long-term transformative effects of emerging technologies, even in the face of failures.