Once obsessed with ads that felt bold and alive, I now find them bland and repetitive. This is a call to bring back originality in the age of AI.
When I graduated from university in 2022, I was still the type of person who would light up when someone asked, “So, what is your favourite ad these days?” I always had an answer. In fact, I would have far too much of an answer. I remember being unhealthily obsessed with that Jason Momoa Super Bowl commercial. Where he peels off his biceps like a Halloween costume, stripping down to this scrawny, self-deprecating version of himself. I would not shut up about it. I would tell friends, family, and anyone who showed a remote interest in storytelling.
Ads used to do that to me. They felt alive, clever, weird, and brave. They gave stories to repeat that could be repeated
Now? If you ask me that same question, I will stare at you like you just asked me to recite a sonnet backwards. Nothing comes to mind. Not because ads are not being made. Oh, they are being mass-produced like buy-one-get-one-free offers. The problem is, they all sound the same. They taste the same. Bland and synthetic, like drinking sparkling water.
We are drowning in content that feels like one caption rewritten a thousand times. And the sad part is that you can taste the prompt. You can sense the laziness behind it, the half-hearted input tossed into ChatGPT like: “Write me a catchy Instagram caption for a luxury women’s fashion brand.” Boom! Out comes another Frankenstein’s monster of clichés, waiting to haunt your feed. Is it just me, or is it actually just rage bait at this point?
Here is the thing: I am not anti-AI. I use it, you probably use it. Everyone uses it. Staying behind is not noble at all. It is naïve, like the uncles at family events, talking about how they will probably never learn to use a smartphone because technology is killing our souls. I do not want to be on that table 30 years from now, thank you very much. The FOMO itself would kill me. My beef is with brands and creatives using AI without editing, without questioning and without their own individual flavour. Because the robotic feel does not sell. It does not resonate. And it certainly does not inspire.
And we all know the giveaways. Words and phrases like “elevate,” “step into,” “upgrade,” “timeless,” “one ___ at a time,” “___ meets ___,” “level up.” You can almost make a birthday party game out of spotting them. Then there is the em dash (—), ChatGPT’s favourite accessory that keeps dangling in captions like it is supposed to be the cherry on top. Brands will drop millions on a campaign and still push out the same caption as their competitors, because both teams used the same lazy prompt. It’s copy-paste déjà vu.
And it is not just advertising. The AI aftertaste has seeped into daily life as well. People do not even send birthday wishes in their own words anymore. I have had people send me messages so generic, I swear ChatGPT itself yawned while writing them. I can literally see the prompt: “Write me a warm but not too cheesy birthday wish.” Complete with—you guessed it—the em dash as the perfect seasoning. I sometimes force myself to reply with an equally ChatGPT-ed message, just to keep the symmetry. It is depressing.
But maybe that is what stings. It is really not about the fact that AI exists, but that people have stopped trying. Because here is the brutal truth. AI cannot give you that weird, sticky idea that lives rent-free in your head for years. It can remix, recycle, and reorganise, but it cannot invent that Jason Momoa muscle-peeling madness that made me giggle for months.
The irony? AI could actually make us more creative if we let it. Imagine using it to handle the boring admin work, freeing up time for us to be playful, risky, and original. But what’s happening instead is a creative Groundhog Day where we accept the first draft, slap it on a post, and call it ‘content.’
And people feel it. They may not know why, but they know it. Campaigns are not landing. Captions are not hitting. Ads just vanish into the noise. That is the true cost of the AI aftertaste, the slow death of originality. If everything sounds the same, nothing matters. And if nothing matters, why would anyone care enough to click, share, or even buy?
I want to love ads again. I want to feel that same adrenaline rush I once did. But that will not happen if we keep outsourcing our originality to machines and calling it a day.
So, here is my unsolicited advice: taste-test your own work. If you can taste the prompt, delete it, or if your copy looks like AI bingo, rewrite it. If you find yourself reaching for words like “timeless” or “elevate,” stop. Please. For everyone’s sake. We can taste it as well, and it is giving… cardboard.
Because the last thing this world needs is another caption that feels like it came straight out of the same machine. We have had enough “elevates” for a lifetime, and honestly, the only thing I want elevated right now is my evening chai.
