Sports Illustrated publisher fires CEO Ross Levinsohn after AI scandal

Sports Illustrated CEO Ross Levinsohn has been fired, following backlash against the magazine for allegedly publishing AI-generated articles

The CEO of The Arena Group, publisher of Sports Illustrated, has been fired just weeks after the magazine was accused of publishing articles generated by artificial intelligence.

Ross Levinsohn was terminated "to improve the operational efficiency and revenue" of the company, Arena Group said in a statement.

It comes amid a wider purge of a number of senior executives at the company since the scandal broke.

Manoj Bhargava will take over as CEO.

But a spokesperson for Mr Bhargava - founder of the 5-Hour Energy drink - told the BBC that Mr Levinsohn's removal "had absolutely nothing to do with the AI issue at all".

He insisted that the move was about ongoing efforts to improve the company. But it comes after the Arena Group fired three of its major executives last week, including chief operating officer Andrew Kraft, media president Rob Barrett and corporate counsel Julie Fenster.

The announcement comes a month after tech news outlet Futurism revealed Sports Illustrated had published several articles with fake author names and headshots from an AI-generated image website.

• Sports Illustrated accused of publishing AI-written articles

The magazine removed the content but disputed the report's accuracy, while launching an internal investigation.

Arena Group licensed the content from a third-party company, Advon Commerce, a company spokesperson said in a statement. Advon Commerce is an e-commerce company that works with retailers and publishers.

In its statement last month, Arena Group claimed that Advon Commerce had assured them "that all of the articles in question were written and edited by humans" and that the e-commerce firm regularly uses "counter-plagiarism and counter-AI software".

As for the fake names, the group said writers were allowed to use pseudonyms "in certain articles" to protect their privacy.

One of the author biographies on the Sports Illustrated website that was allegedly created by artificial intelligence. The photo was found for sale on a website that sells AI-generated headshots.

The brief statement from Arena Group announcing Mr Levinsohn's firing did not mention the scandal.

This incident at Sports Illustrated comes as concern grows in the media world that generative artificial intelligence could cheaply replace journalists and potentially spread misinformation. Various newsrooms have experimented with AI or released guidelines for employees and audiences to explain their approach towards it.

Some newsrooms have made headlines, however, after publishing AI articles that included errors or falsehoods. Others gained attention for not marking stories as AI generated.

Numerous Sports Illustrated staff said on social media that they were appalled by the findings in Futurist's report, particularly as Arena Group has made large cuts to staff in recent years.

In a statement at the time, the Sports Illustrated Union said "these practices violate everything we believe in about journalism".

"We demand the company commit to adhering to basic journalistic standards, including not publishing computer-written stories by fake people," the union said on X.