Indonesia’s Media Balances AI and Human Judgment

KBRN, Jakarta: The mass media continuously evolves with the transition from the printed era to digital and the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI). Heading for 2026, AI has redefined how media works in Indonesia through technology integration that accelerates research, news drafting, and search engine optimization (SEO).

In the dialog held at RRI Voice of Indonesia Studio on Wednesday (12/31/2025), media expert Nurhassan Murtiaji conveyed that AI is now a daily assistant in newsrooms. "AI helps journalists conduct quick research, transcribe news, and instantly generate weather and sports reports. "This makes the news production process much cheaper, more accurate, and more efficient for editors and the public," Nurhassan stated.

While offering efficiency gains, the use of AI also presents significant challenges in the form of the threat of manipulated content or deepfakes. Responding to this, Asep Setiawan, a political science lecturer at Muhammadiyah University Jakarta, affirmed the importance of verification by mainstream media amidst the information overload on social media.

"2026 will be a 'battle' period for mainstream media to verify information circulating in the public. "The media must adhere to the Press Law and the Journalistic Code of Ethics to ensure the public is not exposed to hoaxes or political disinformation generated by negative actors thru AI," Asep stated.

On the technical side, AI media practitioner, Afis Yafril, highlighted the role of AI in supporting content creativity, such as voice cloning for radio broadcasts and the creation of original, royalty-free music. However, Afis cautioned that this technological sophistication must still involve human control or human on the loop.

"AI is a smart assistant to support decisions, not a decision-maker. "Journalists are still needed to provide 'soul' and feeling to news that algorithms cannot generate," Afis conveyed.

Concluding the discussion, the experts agreed that the success of media in 2026 depends on a balance between technological sophistication and human thinking. This year is predicted to be the era of digital maturity, where AI literacy becomes a basic curriculum that must be mastered to maintain public trust.

The media is expected not only to prioritize speed, but also to uphold the principle of transparency by including a disclaimer if content is produced with the assistance of AI.