Research center TiCC receives third grant for robo-journalism research in six months

In this project, two PhD researchers will study how different emotions impact the words and phrases that speakers use. A postdoc researcher (to be stationed at Twente University, and working under supervision of Mariet Theune) will develop a computational system that can automatically produce news reports with different subtle emotional shadings, ranging from happiness to disappointment. The hypothesis is that this will make automatically produced news reports (‘robo-journalism’) more engaging to read.

Automatic production of online newsreports

This is the third accepted TiCC project within six months related to robo-journalism, and automatic text generation in general, with a total research budget of almost two million euro’s. Earlier this year, a joint project between TiCC, Radboud University Nijmegen and Sanoma Media BV (publisher of, among many other titles, nu.nl, LINDA., and Viva) was awarded an NWO Creative Industry grant for the development of a computational system that can automatically summarize online discussions (such as those found on, for instance, the Viva forum) to facilitate reading these on a tablet. TiCC researchers Sander Wubben and Emiel Krahmer will participate in this project.

These same two researchers are also involved in the recently awarded ‘Automated Newsroom’ RAAK-PRO project, a collaboration between TiCC and the Fontys Future Media Lab (Hille van der Kaa), and funded by SIA. In this project, researchers will develop tools to be used in a newsroom, that can automatically produce new news reports and rewrite existing ones for specific target groups. Various media organisations support the project, including the Telegraaf Media Group and the NDP News Media Consortium (representing De Persgroep, RTL and ANP, among other).