Why AI-Generated Holiday Ads Fail, and What They Teach Us
Rigorous UX-research take on exactly which visual failures make viewers disengage.
Open nngroup.com →
Marketing & Growth
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Thread
Thread
Article
Article
Article
Article
What's the realistic quality bar, what works and what still looks fake?
The models cleared the famous Will Smith spaghetti test in 2025, but the tells moved rather than vanished: physics drift, dead-eyed emotion, inconsistent lighting, and rubbery hands still betray fully synthetic humans, which is why Coca-Cola's AI Christmas ads got roasted two years running. What reliably works today: b-roll, landscapes, product-in-scene shots, stylised or absurdist comedy (the Kalshi trick), and AI voiceover. What still reads fake: photoreal human close-ups carrying emotional weight. Match the format to the model and keep humans on script and edit.
Go deeper
18 resources.
Rethinking AI-generated advertising: how real people really react
Actual consumer testing of AI ads instead of Twitter vibes.
Open kantar.com →AI ads and the uncanny valley problem
India-market analysis of why imported AI aesthetics collapse local emotional connection.
Open campaignindia.in →AI video commercials are spreading, but people won't trust uncanny valley endorsements
Names the trust cost of synthetic endorsers that founders often ignore.
Open techradar.com →Coca-Cola Sparks Backlash With AI-Generated Christmas Ad, Again
The highest-profile cautionary tale: a legendary emotional brand failing the bar twice.
Open forbes.com →What brands can learn from Coca-Cola's terrible AI Christmas ad
Craft-level autopsy of the specific frames that broke, useful as a checklist.
Open creativebloq.com →What Marketers Can Learn From Backlash To Coke AI Ads
Trade-press view on when 'made with AI' becomes the story instead of your product.
Open mediapost.com →Coca-Cola's AI holiday ad triggers backlash
Quick, shareable summary of the backlash mechanics for your team.
Open contentgrip.com →Google's Veo 3 Nails the Infamous Will Smith Eating Spaghetti Test
The moment the internet's favourite quality benchmark fell, with the footage.
Open petapixel.com →How Will Smith Eating Spaghetti Became a Benchmark for AI Video Progress
Two years of quality progress compressed into one legible story.
Open hackernoon.com →AI Nailed The 'Will Smith Eating Spaghetti' Test. What Now?
Where the quality frontier sits after the benchmark broke, and what still fails.
Open forbes.com →Sora 2: Examples, Critiques, and Early Impressions
Honest catalogue of Sora 2 wins and artifacts, with clips you can inspect.
Open datacamp.com →MKBHD's full Sora breakdown (thread)
The most-watched independent reviewer's first hard look at AI video's limits.
Open x.com →Observations on MKBHD's Sora review
A creative technologist annotates exactly which failures matter for commercial work.
Open x.com →OpenAI's Sora is launching today: highlights from the first review
Useful baseline: compare these 2024 flaws with today's output to calibrate the trendline.
Open techcrunch.com →What makes an AI avatar seem human, according to Synthesia's CEO
The person with the most skin in the game defines where the uncanny valley actually sits.
Open fortune.com →Is Ad Biz Rediscovering Its Voice in AI's Uncanny Valley?
Argues the winning move is leaning into AI's otherness instead of faking realism.
Open musebyclios.com →Sora 2 vs Veo 3.1: I tested both with 7 audio prompts
Hands-on test showing the quality gap now lives in audio and spatial realism, not pixels.
Open tomsguide.com →More in Video, Image & Audio
- How are founders making product demos, ads, and social video with AI (Veo, Sora, Runway, HeyGen, ElevenLabs)? 18 →
- Why can a solo founder now do what needed an agency? 17 →
- Which AI video tool should I actually use, and for what job? 17 →
- How are founders using AI avatars and UGC-style actors instead of hiring creators? 19 →
- How are founders using AI voice, music, and audio (ElevenLabs, Suno, NotebookLM)? 17 →
- How do founders create product images, brand visuals, and logos with AI? 17 →
- What does AI video and image actually cost, and what's a sensible starter stack on a founder budget? 13 →
- How do you write prompts that actually get usable AI video and images? 16 →
- How do you keep characters and brand look consistent across AI-generated scenes and assets? 16 →
- How do founders dub and localize video into Indian and global languages with AI? 14 →
- How do founders turn one long recording into weeks of short clips? 14 →
- What are the legal, copyright, and disclosure rules for AI-generated marketing content? 18 →
- Do AI-made ads actually perform, or is it hype? 14 →
Also in Starting Up
The same ground, over in Brand, web & content, our Starting Up track.
eChai Partner Brands
