AI Slop Fatigue & Open AI’s Code Red

Welcome to The Uncertain Times – our perspective on the latest shifts in business, brand and tech. Inside this edition:

The $16 Billion Robbery: Why Meta’s ‘scam economy’ is the real accountability story of 2025
The Disney/OpenAI Alliance: Why the ‘Disney Vault’ is opening up for AI-driven fan direction
A Creative S’Cannes’dal: Lessons in honesty from the Grand Prix that wasn’t
Crisis Management 101: How American Eagle and Tylenol survived the year’s biggest PR storms
The Power of Reruns: Why Amazon’s ‘Joy Ride’ proved that great creative never wears out

Is AI a scapegoat for a $16 Billion Moral Blind Spot?

While marketers were debating ‘Brand Purpose’ and attending ‘Ethics in AI’ summits, a scarier reality hid in our ad dashboards.

The tech story of the year isn’t AI – it’s accountability.

The 2025 Reuters investigation into Meta’s internal documents has pulled back the curtain on a ‘fraud economy’ that’s systematically enabled by the platforms we fund.

It’s time to demand transparency and realise that the tools we use too often optimise for revenue, not for our brands’ safety or customer well-being.

The mathematics of moral bankruptcy

The numbers involved aren’t just high. They’re terrifying. Meta internal data reveals roughly 10% of its annual ad revenue – approximately $16 billion in 2024 alone – comes from fraudulent ads.

To put that in perspective: $16 billion is comparable to the annual global profit of McDonald’s.

Meta serves users an estimated $15 billion ‘higher risk’ ads every single day.

In the time it takes you to read this story, Meta has distributed over 10 million ads that its own internal systems flag as potential fraud.

The 95% reluctance rate

So why aren’t these ads being stopped? Meta’s systems are reportedly tuned with a 95% ‘reluctance rate’. The system only bans an advertiser if it’s at least 95% certain they’re a criminal. If it falls below that – say, to 90% – Meta doesn’t block the account. It simply charges the advertiser more money to keep running.

Meta earns 66 times more from fraudulent ads than it’s willing to spend to stop them.

The cost of doing business

Meta is not blind to the risk. Leaked documents show the company anticipates annual regulatory fines of up to $1 billion. But when the fine for robbing a bank is $1 billion and the robbery nets you $16 billion, the fine isn’t a penalty – it’s just the cost of doing business.

If we claim to care about ethical advertising, our silence can’t go on.

The ‘Magic & Machine’ alliance – The Disney/OpenAI deal

The most significant boundary in media just collapsed. The Walt Disney Company’s $1B partnership with OpenAI isn’t just a tech deal – it’s a total rewrite of how brands, intellectual property and audiences interact.

For years, the ‘Disney Vault’ was the ultimate symbol of copyright protection. Today, it’s becoming an open sandbox.

What actually happened? Disney is licensing over 200 iconic characters (from Marvel to Star Wars) to be used within OpenAI’s Sora. For the first time, fans can ‘direct’ official IP, blurring the line between professional production and user-generated content.

The Bottom Line: The ‘Disney Precedent’ proves that AI isn’t a threat to creativity – it’s an extension of it. The value for agencies and brands now lies in Strategic Curation and Prompt Architecture, not just execution.

A creative S[Cannes]dal / s‘Cannes’dal

When AI fabricates success

While Disney was opening its vault, the Cannes Lions 2025 festival was tearing down pedestals. In a move that stunned the industry, the festival revoked the Creative Data Grand Prix from Brazilian agency DM9.

The Scandal: The agency was caught using AI to fabricate ‘real-world’ results in its case study film – including fake CNN news segments and AI-generated consumer interviews praising a campaign for Whirlpool’s Consul brand.

The Fallout: The agency’s CCO resigned. Cannes immediately imposed mandatory AI disclosure rules and AI-led fact-checking for all 2026 entries.

The Agency Take: This is a warning shot to every shop in the world. AI can enhance your process, but if you use it to fabricate your outcomes, your brand (and your agency) is finished.

Olivia Phillips, Creative Strategist adds: “The lines between enhancement and fabrication are blurring. We know that consumers are resistant to AI but if judges of creativity are already struggling to identify its work then audiences won’t stand a chance. Going forward, creative excellence won’t be defined by the absence of AI, but by the honesty of its use.“

Technology from the future, crisis management from the past

Two iconic brands, American Eagle and Tylenol, found themselves in the crosshairs of massive public scandals. While their controversies were worlds apart, their survival came down to a single choice: knowing when to speak up and when to be quiet.

American Eagle: The ‘Ragebait’ win

When American Eagle (AE) launched its campaign featuring Sydney Sweeney with the punny tagline ‘Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’, the internet exploded. Critics accused the brand of ‘eugenics dog-whistling’ and white supremacy aesthetics.

The response: Total dismissal. AE didn’t offer a groveling apology. They didn’t fire their agency. They simply stated: The campaign is and always was about the jeans.

By refusing to engage in the political narrative, they protected the brand’s salience (reputation).

The result: For the 99% of customers who ignore Twitter, the ‘scandal’ was just a loud reminder that AE has cool denim. Search traffic doubled. Sales hit record highs. In this case, controversy was just free reach.

Tylenol: The ‘Fabian’ Silence

Tylenol’s crisis was far more lethal. In late 2025, President Trump and RFK Jr. declared war on acetaminophen, claiming a link to the ‘autism epidemic’ and warning pregnant women to stay away.

The response: The ‘Fabian Strategy’. Tylenol couldn’t treat this like fame. This was a product safety attack. They employed the Fabian Strategy – a military tactic of wearing down an opponent through avoidance.

They didn’t argue with the President.

They issued one dry, clinical statement and went dark, forcing the medical community and independent doctors to step in and defend them.

The result: By not legitimising the political debate, Tylenol allowed the news cycle to drift toward the next distraction. They moved the fight from the front page to the courtroom, where facts rule the day.

Amazon ‘Regift’ their Christmas advert for one more ‘Joy Ride’ proving the power of creative consistency

Amazon ran the exact same Christmas ad in 2025 that they used in 2023 (‘Joy Ride’).

It worked because consumers don’t get sick of ads as fast as marketers do.

The benefit: By rerunning a proven 5.9-star creative (the highest possible on System1), Amazon saved production millions that could be moved into buying better airtime. It proves that creative consistency is often more powerful than a new idea.

The common thread in these stories? Intentionality. Whether it’s demanding accountability from platforms, being honest about AI in our work or having the nerve to stand by our creative, the era of being tactical delivery people is over. We must be the architects of a cleaner, more honest industry that knows right from wrong.

Sources and references

The Uncertain Times: Meta’s $16B moral blind spot and other lessons in integrity