Cannes reflections: AI took centre stage, but didn’t address our industry’s profound questions
Opinion
Cannes attendees were both excited by and terrified of the impact AI could have on our industry. How should we manage those two opposing emotions?
I mean, come on — was Cannes 2025 ever going to be about anything but AI?
Granted, retail media and creators were in amongst the medals as worthy runner ups — but the “winner” (and by an absolute canter) was of course AI.
The beachfront, the tech yachts, the balconies high up in the various hotels that overlook the Croisette were all teaming with AI energy. Ultra compelling, seductive tales of enhanced efficiency, supercharged effectiveness and a shared expectation that AI will take off our hands the tedious process-driven-largely-spreadsheet-based stuff we all loathe.
Beneath the hype there was little to zero mention of how AI is helping media become more environmentally sustainable. Or how it could help create a safer internet for children & teens. Or how it might help crack the cross-channel measurement conundrum.
All big, profound questions the industry will be wrestling with once the dust on our ChatGPT-infused post-Cannes Linkedin posts has settled.
Cognitive dissonance
One friend and senior creative-type likened using AI in the ad creation process to the Enhanced Games (think the Olympics but on steroids, literally).
Their provocation: can we ever really call it creativity if we’re not all playing by the same rules?
Despite the gloom-peddling they did seemed buoyed by a belief that clients will place a new value on serendipity, quirks and human imperfections in order to stand out from the “AI slop”.
From the snatched conversations, overheard chats and off-mic moments I came across there was most certainly a boat-load (sorry) of cognitive dissonance at play.
The Cannes-goers I came across were simultaneously enthralled and excited by AI’s breathtaking potential, but at the same time borderline terrified about what elements of their livelihood it will replace. A kind of mental whiplash between glass half-full enthusiasm and existential dread all playing out in real time.
And if you accept that the whiplash is real and is here to stay (for the foreseeable at least) perhaps it is within that tension that we’ll do our best work as an industry.
James Chandler is Chief Strategy Officer at IAB UK and co-host of AI podcast AI Haven’t a Clue.