I am incredibly unimpressed with Kris Hammond's hype machine (although i think that what Narrative Science does is cool).

But this isn't the first bot that the LA Times has operated either. Folks like Ben Welsh (who works at the LA Times, and did this awesome lightning talk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iP-On8PzEy8 ) and Matt Waite (who won a Pulitzer Prize for Politifact & now teaches at University of Nebraska Lincoln) have also been writing bots to help with the reporting process (and yes in some case actually generate copy) for years.

Narrative Science certainly was not the first or only group to do this.