Not many local news outlets organize events on the scale of the Vermont Tech Jam, which drew a steady crowd of all ages to Burlington’s Hula campus on Saturday.
Seven Days couldn’t do it without our employees, who pitch in to help staff the annual job fair and tech expo — our 18th. Almost everyone takes a shift, from setting up the exhibition space to directing attendees to the bathrooms. Many of our employees really enjoy it. Food editor Melissa Pasanen, who teaches a course on professional development at the University of Vermont, spent two hours as “concierge,” happily dispensing career counseling to strangers.
Veteran Seven Days reporter Ken Picard was there to moderate a panel discussion on artificial intelligence in health care — also the topic of his story in last week’s issue — with three local experts in the field: a doctor, an entrepreneur and an ethicist. Right before the talk, I found him preparing in the tiny office that served as our headquarters for the day. Ken, who just turned 60, was no doubt thinking about the ease with which ChatGPT “wrote” the intro for his session, as he would later reveal onstage.
In the little room, too, was the young Sam Hartnett, a recent graduate of UVM and its growing Center for Community News. He worked as our news reporting intern over the summer, eagerly diving into tricky stories about politics — he covered both “No Kings” protests as well as demonstrations at the airport and on the border — and other fast-moving subjects. When his internship ended in August, we put him to work on some less glamorous projects.
Sam was bent over a mundane Tech Jam task when Ken, musing about AI, said to no one in particular: “I’m just glad I’m not starting my journalism career now.”
Sam responded sarcastically: “Thanks, Ken.”
I want to tell Sam that he needn’t worry, but, in good conscience, I can’t. The ways in which AI sorts, transcribes and summarizes information can help journalists save time and navigate complicated data. But its ability to comb the entire internet at lightning-fast speed and assemble its bottomless trove of ideas into a cogent narrative per specific commands is an existential threat to every aspiring storyteller — except, perhaps, the most accomplished.
How does one become the kind of journalist who transforms reams of crucial information into artful prose? It takes years of practice — countless drafts and revisions — to learn how to organize and compose a compelling story, and to develop your own unique and authentic voice. AI seems to offer a shortcut, but in fact it’s a replacement for the critical thinking upon which the best journalism — and, arguably, our civilization — depends.
And, once we cede these responsibilities to AI, who will find the stories that haven’t already been told? On-the-ground reporting remains the only way to unearth some truths, including those that have been deliberately hidden.
While we were working at the Tech Jam, the Vermont International Film Festival was showing Cover-Up, a new documentary about Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh. He exposed atrocities the U.S. government purposefully concealed, including the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War and, more recently, abuse of prisoners at the Iraqi prison Abu Ghraib.
Maybe AI will help the next generation of reporters reveal future perversions of power, but I for one haven’t given up on human curiosity and drive — traits Sam has in abundance.
This article appears in Oct 29 – Nov 4 2025.
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