Make Creativity Great Again
Remember before the internet?
People believed that the cause of stupidity was a lack of access to information. Yeah, it wasn't that.
And now we inhabit a world where everyone has a magic wand, and most make rabbits disappear.
Remember also when PowerPoint templates (ugh) were the height of automation, and 'pivot to video' meant hiring a cameraman?
Welcome to 2025. AI has democratised creativity in the same way karaoke democratised singing. Everyone can do it, but should they?
These tools applied without expertise generate a fresh kind of hell. I imagine the algorithms are yawning at us. The most dangerous part isn't that everyone can make content now—it's that we're training ourselves to accept mediocrity as the new baseline.
The algorithms aren't just bored—they're probably wondering why we're all trying so hard to think like them.
I've been wrestling with this paradox lately. I find AI to be an incredible creative partner and encourage people to dive in, yet like many others, I'm disappointed by how we're using it, even from genuinely creative and skilled people. We are wading through so much banal content that's effortless to generate but creatively bankrupt.
So here are my thoughts on navigating this strange new world without losing our souls.
My rules for not sucking
ONE: Let’s not make even more boring stuff more efficiently.
TWO: Apply AI like your morning espresso—wake up your thinking, don't replace it. Generate ideas to react to, not to be slavish to.
THREE: AI amplifies what you bring. If that's nothing, you get sophisticated nothing.
FOUR: If it were too easy to make, it would be easy to ignore. Great work comes when such convenience meets our creative resistance.
FIVE: Balance structure with chaos. Feed AI the constraints, then break them. Creativity lives at that collision of logic and illogic, not through compliance.
SIX: AI gives perfect answers to mediocre questions. Our job isn't simply to prompt better—it's to ask better. My go-to right now is "What if the opposite were true?"
SEVEN: Our quirks, mistakes, and weird associations are creative features, not bugs. AI should amplify your voice, not drown it in elevator music.
EIGHT: If you're bored making it, everyone will be bored consuming it.
It seems to me that the more powerful these tools become, the more our taste matters. And remember: The algorithms can make anything. Only we humans can make it matter.
