Learn about the tech reporters who use AI to help write and edit their stories

When technology reporter Alex Heath has the scoop. He’s sitting at his computer and talking into a microphone. He’s not talking to a fellow human — Heath went independent from Substack last year — he’s talking to Claude. Using the AI-powered voice-to-text service Wispr Flow, Heath relays his ideas to an AI agent, then lets him write his first draft.

Heath sat down with me last week to show me how he incorporates Anthropic’s Claude Cowork into his journalistic process. The AI ​​tool is connected to his Gmail account, Google Calendar, Granola AI transcription service, and Notion notes. He has also acquired a detailed skill – a personalized set of instructions – to help Claude write in his style, including the “Ten Commandments” for writing like Alex Heath. The skill includes previous articles he’s written, instructions on how he likes to organize his newsletters, and notes about his voice and writing style.

Claude Cowork then automates the drafting process that was happening in Heath’s head. After the agent finishes his first draft, Heath goes back and forth with it for up to 30 minutes, suggesting revisions. It’s a very complicated process, and he still writes some parts of the story himself. But Heath says this workflow saves him hours each week, and he now spends 30 to 40 percent less time writing.

“I always hated the zero-to-one process of writing stories… but now, it’s actually kind of fun,” he says. “When I went out on my own, I realized I needed AI to help with the volume.”

Heath is part of a growing group of technology reporters who are using artificial intelligence to help write and edit their stories. The AI ​​workflow is particularly attractive to journalists who have gone freelance, losing valuable resources like editors and fact-checkers that typically come with a traditional newsroom. Rather than simply prompting ChatGPT to write stories, freelance journalists say they are recreating these resources using artificial intelligence.

Their use raises broader questions about the value of human journalists in general. If people are using AI to write, edit, and fact check their stories, what do humans bring to the table? A recent study by researchers at Google DeepMind suggests that using AI in a lazy way can make your writing more uniform. It is less creative, has less voice, and takes a more neutral stance. To use AI well, the journalists I spoke to say they need to understand why people pay for their work in the first place. (WIRED policy prohibits the use of artificial intelligence in writing or editing.)

While some writers have built a career on their analysis and prose, Heath sees his value as being able to get the scoop. Claude makes it easier for him to spend more time chatting with sources and delivering information to his subscribers.

Several longtime journalists have remarked to me that Heath’s workflow looks like a modern version of an ancient institution: the rewriting desk. In the days before laptops and smartphones, field reporters would call their stories into the newsroom, where writers behind desks would quickly weave those reported details into articles they could print for the next day’s newspaper. This allowed some reporters to spend their days covering events and talking to sources. In a way, Claude is now Heath’s rewriting office.

“I feel like I’m cheating in an amazing way,” Heath says. “I never did it because I loved being a writer. I love reporting, learning new things, having an edge, and telling people things that will make them feel smart six months from now.”

Jasmine Sun, who previously worked as a product manager at Substack, recently launched her own newsletter covering AI culture and Silicon Valley. Last week, I published an article in The Atlantic about how post-training makes AI models bad at writing by essentially overpowering their creativity. For this reason, Sun had never used AI in writing, but she saw promise in using Claude as an editor.