The German magazine Die Aktuelle's 16th April edition carried a front page World Sensation First Interview with Michael Schumacher.
Which came as a surprise to the Schumacher family.
Since the Formula One legend suffered a horrifying sking accident in 2013 he has not been seen or heard in public, and no interview had been granted.
So where had the quotes in the article come from?
There was a clue on the magazines front page. The banner reading Es klingt täuschend echt tells us it sounds 'deceptively real'.
And that's what the article is, deception.
Die Aktuelle took a whole screed of Schumacher speech and plugged it into an algorithm. Then they asked the program a bunch of questions, and wrote the responses up as if it were an interview of the seven time world champion.
The family are considering legal action.
Without knowing what caveats the magazine inserted, and how German law may view the matter, there is little but speculation to offer.
But man do I have opinions.
Recent adverts with a computer generated Alfred Einstein flogging energy are tacky. But at least the man is long dead and there's no attempt to portray it as the ACTUAL Einstein.
This pretence of an interview with someone still alive, but out of public view for ten years, is atrocious.
I can understand some bright eyed wonk hopped up on caffeine and enthusiasm pitching the idea at a brainstorming session.
Beyond that?
Surely there should have been someone in the editorial staff, or legal team, capable of calling out the utter ghoulishness of the idea, and preventing it from happening.
There are journalists who have lost jobs for creating quotes. What punishment for the artifice of a whole interview? Though calling such a thing journalism is to stretch the term well beyond natural limits.
It's journalism in the same way jumping off a pier with a pair of wings strapped to your arms is aviation.
And yet, it is unlikely to be a lone occurence.
And there will be other tweaks. How long before we read of an interview being 'enhanced' by algorithm responses, whereby the person has given answers to questions but maybe they are a bit vague or just dull.
This genie is out of the bottle and there will be numerous unscrupulous folks willing to jump on the bandwagon of fake interviews in search of a dollar.
text by stuartcturnbull. Picture by Philip Myrtorp
