The world as we know it is changing, and changing fast, but in some ways, I think people really want to go back in time a little bit. 2026 is being touted as the year of analogue- or so I have read in a few places on the internet. The irony of that last sentence is not lost on me. For the first time since 2022, social media use is on the decline amongst young adults and teens. Australia banned social media for minors, in a move that I hope we see replicated in other parts.

Could it be that more people want to put their phones away and experience something real? Is that why AI ads face as much backlash as they do?  The very core of my being smiled when the AI Christmas Coke ad got panned. I feel a sneaky joy when the public hates these ads. But when I try to break down why people hated it, I can’t say that it looked terrible or that it was bad by any measure.
 
In stark comparison, the new Apple TV intro was applauded. And was it because, along with the intro, we saw behind the scenes of how it was made very painstakingly? We were able to see the effort and thought that went into it. And we, as a collective, valued that.

In a social experiment that I have no means to verify, people perceived works created by humans to have more value than those they believed were AI-generated. They had less trust in brands that used AI. I think that means we will start to see more proof of life, with credits made by humans, like in Apple TV’s new show Pluribus.

I think more and more we will see artists claiming loudly and proudly that no AI was used. Rosalia’s called her latest album Lux- a human album. Recording all the pieces with live musicians. Guillermo del Toro,  talking about his recent film Frankenstein, said,  I’d like to tell the rest of our extraordinary cast and crew that the artistry of all of them shines on every single frame of this film that was wilfully made by humans.

I suspect advertising will also see a Halo effect; we will see more brands that want to be real. There will be a little super somewhere along with the rotate your phone for better viewing, that says Human-made. I think it will change the film language of things,, where keeping it real and raw will win over making it look too clean and perfect. More wrinkles, more pores, more making it look less like something AI could do.

Each scene bursting with action that no amount of prompting could produce. The kind of small nuance of human truth that AI hasn’t learnt. I believe it will push us to create better and differently. Push ourselves to rediscover the old and invent new. To build and engineer, to collaborate and create fresher. AI has somehow pushed us to be more human.

Am I delusionally optimistic about a future that wants to live a little longer in the past? Yes, yes, yes, I am.

The author is a director, mom and foodie. The article first appeared in the February issue of Manifest in our monthly 'Her Take' series. Get your copy here.