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🎨 ‘Slop’ Is Merriam-Webster's Word for AI Content

The Story: Merriam-Webster has named “slop” its 2025 Word of the Year, officially recognizing the term for low-quality digital content, from images to videos, produced in large quantities by artificial intelligence. The selection highlights growing public awareness and frustration with the flood of AI-generated media that now populates social feeds and the web.

The Details:

• The dictionary's new definition for slop is “digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence.”

• Examples of slop include absurd AI videos, strange advertising images, and junky AI-written digital books.

• Originally meaning “soft mud” in the 1700s, the word evolved to mean “food waste” before its modern AI-related usage.

• Merriam-Webster's president noted the word is 'illustrative' and reflects a public that finds AI content "fascinating, annoying and a little bit ridiculous."

• The dictionary’s editors see the term's rise as a "defiant word" that signals a growing desire for genuine, human-made creativity.

Why It Matters: For visual creators, the mainstreaming of "slop" creates a clear distinction between mass-produced AI content and high-quality human craft. This presents an opportunity to position your work as authentic and valuable, commanding a premium by emphasizing the skill, taste, and storytelling that AI-generated visuals currently lack.

PRODUCTION MASTERY
The commercial aspects of creativity.

🎬 Top Creatives Unite to Set AI Rules 

The Story: A group of over 500 Hollywood insiders, including filmmaker Daniel Kwan and actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt, have formed the Creators Coalition on AI (CCAI). The new organization aims to be a central hub for establishing shared standards, best practices, and ethical protections for AI's use in the entertainment industry.

The Details:

• The coalition's mission is to serve as a central hub to upgrade the industry’s systems and institutions regarding AI.

• Its work is guided by four pillars: transparency and compensation, job protection, guards against misuse, and safeguarding humanity in creativity.

• Founding members include Daniel Kwan and Natasha Lyonne, with over 500 signatories like Cate Blanchett and Rian Johnson.

• The group was partly propelled by Disney's recent $1 billion partnership with OpenAI, which blindsided many in the industry.

• The coalition aims to create an "action road map" that could be used as a model for other industries like education and healthcare.

Why It Matters: This coalition represents a crucial move by creators to proactively shape the business rules of AI engagement, rather than reactively accepting terms set by tech giants. For freelancers and agencies, the standards set here could influence future contracts, IP rights, compensation models, and job security across the entire creative industry.

CREATOR ECONOMY
Navigating the digital creative world.

💰 Meta Reportedly Prioritizes Billions From Scam Ads

The Story: According to a Reuters investigation, Meta is knowingly earning billions from scam ads, which made up roughly 10% of its revenue in 2024. The report alleges Meta disbanded a successful anti-fraud team after its efforts reduced revenue from Chinese advertisers, prioritizing profit over platform safety and integrity.

The Details:

• Internal documents projected that ads for scams and banned goods would generate around $16 billion, or 10% of Meta's revenue, in 2024.

• An anti-fraud team focused on China successfully cut rule-breaking ads in half before it was reportedly disbanded following an order to 'pause' work.

• After the team was dissolved, the volume of scam ads from Chinese advertisers quickly returned to their previous high levels.

• Meta's policy only bans advertisers if its systems are at least 95% certain they are committing fraud, according to the documents.

• In response to the reports, U.S. senators have called for investigations into Meta's advertising practices.

Why It Matters: For creators and brands paying for reach, this erodes trust in Meta's ad ecosystem, forcing legitimate content to compete with a flood of low-quality scams. It devalues the platform as a reliable marketing channel, raises questions about ad effectiveness, and could push advertisers to seek more transparent alternatives.

🔥 Press Worthy

📽️ VISUAL CREATORS

Illustrator Franki Domino is building a career on a unique AI-generated aesthetic. By painstakingly refining Midjourney outputs to avoid a generic look, he has developed a distinct style that has secured commercial commissions and representation from the illustration agency Colagene.

Adobe has launched a web-based Firefly video editor, now in public beta. It features a timeline for assembling clips and new prompt-to-edit controls for making precise changes to generated video. A separate tool in Firefly Boards can now upscale footage to 4K.

📈 PRODUCTION MASTERY

Hollywood's future was debated at a Content London panel, where executives discussed runaway production, strikes, and AI. Producer Frank Spotnitz argued California's tax incentives are failing, comparing the grim state of L.A. production to "Detroit in the 1980s."

Adobe announced record revenue of $23.77 billion for its 2025 fiscal year, crediting the rapid adoption of its AI tools for the 11% year-over-year growth. AI-influenced services now account for over a third of the company's annual recurring revenue.

🎭 CREATOR ECONOMY

YouTube is testing still image carousels in the Shorts feed, bringing a popular Instagram and TikTok feature to the platform. The experiment allows creators to post up to 10 images, offering a new format to tell stories and reach audiences without producing video.

A new report from eMarketer highlights the outsized value of TikTok's U.S. audience. While American users represent just 10% of the platform's total user base, they generate a staggering 41% of its advertising revenue, underscoring their significant purchasing power for creators and brands.

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