Tech Tonic Remember when AI was saving entertainment? How did that work out?

The Hollywood side of things: All hype, a little magic

Let’s start with the film world, which spent most of 2025 doing an awkward dance between embracing AI and pretending it wasn’t actually using it. The fact is, no matter how much the actors protest, the reality is that Disney has invested a billion dollars in OpenAI and licensed Sora for video production. Studios likely discussed AI projects in the boardroom, while remaining silent in public, afraid to antagonize the same actors and writers who ended up attacking this exact issue in 2023. The most telling moment? Tilly Norwood.

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he remembers? The AI-generated “actress” who became the most controversial non-person of 2025. Produced by producer Aline van der Velden’s company Particle6, Tilly was unveiled at the Zurich Film Festival with the announcement that talent agencies were circling to represent her. The reaction was swift and brutal. SAG-AFTRA issued a statement emphasizing that creativity must remain human-centered, and declaring that Tilly Norwood “is not an actor”. Actresses like Emily Blunt called it “terrible”, while Whoopi Goldberg pointed to the unfair advantage of AI composites trained on the work of thousands of real artists without permission or compensation. Van der Velden’s defence? Tilly was “art”, not a replacement for man. She had to go through 2,000 iterations to achieve “girl next door” authenticity, designed to “provoke a reaction”. I guess mission accomplished.

But the thing is this. Tilly’s first sketch, “AI Commissioner”, was universally condemned. Critics described it as “consistently unfunny”, with dialogue “loosely written, woodenly delivered” and actions so awkward that they gave reviewers “screaming fantasies”. After 700,000 YouTube views, what did Hollywood learn? That you can create a technically competent digital puppet, but you can’t automatically make it attractive to watch. Yet Tilly wasn’t Hollywood’s only AI controversy.

The two Oscar front-runners are caught in the crossfire. ‘The Brutalist’ used AI tool Respecher to refine Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones’ Hungarian accents, as well as employ generative AI to create architectural drawings for the film’s finale. Emilia Pérez used a similar method to extend the vocal range of star Carla Sofia Gascón, and blended her voice with that of French singer Camille. Both films attempted to use AI by presenting it as a practical problem-solver. I get it, Hungarian is really hard to pronounce, and some vowel registers were also hard to reach. But the optics were terrible. These revelations came during the awards season, sparking a heated debate about the authenticity of the performance. The Academy is now considering mandatory AI disclosure requirements for future Oscar submissions.

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Still, it made the central tension clear – if we’re using AI to “fix” what human performers can’t do properly, are we still watching human performance? Which takes me back to the question I’ve often asked AI executives over the past few years – at what point does AI generation stop being classified as art? I have not received any satisfactory answer yet.

The picture behind the scenes is blurry. Studios are experimenting with AI at all, they’re just too afraid to admit it publicly. Open secrets include the use of AI chatbots to rework scripts, assist with marketing campaigns, etc., all the while worrying that those same tools will eliminate their jobs. Disney’s billion-dollar bet on OpenAI shows where the money is going, even though 2025 hasn’t given us a moment to show that AI is better than Hollywood, and vice versa. Another case in point, Coca Cola’s holiday season ads that were proudly crafted with AI, and yet supposedly required 100 humans and 70,000 AI generated clips to bring them to life.

Director Rian Johnson has called AI “making everything worse in every way.” Filmmaker Bong Joon Ho was serious about jokingly organizing a military team to destroy the technology (is there a place where other people can sign up for this mission?). The creative community isn’t buying what Silicon Valley is selling.

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music’s messy embrace

The music industry’s relationship with AI has, if anything, been even more chaotic. At least Hollywood can hide behind “enhancing” human performance and streamlining complex processes. Music is brimming with AI that can create entire songs from text prompts in seconds, and listeners mostly can’t tell the difference.

A Deezer and Ipsos study in November dropped a bombshell – 97% of listeners failed to completely distinguish between AI-generated tracks and human-produced music. Think about that. Ninety-seven percent. When told these results, 71% were surprised, and 52% felt uncomfortable. The uncanny valley isn’t so uncanny anymore, and that’s really the problem.

Tools like Suno and Udio gained immense popularity in 2025, allowing anyone to type a few words and get a complete song with vocals, instruments, and complete arrangement. This democratization was lauded by campaigners (you wouldn’t expect anything different). Musicians, for whom is this a profession marked by blood, sweat and tears? Not so much. They saw AI-generated projects like Bleeding Verse amass 916,000 Spotify listeners. Lucas Woodland, lead singer of the rock band Holding Absence, called it the following – “shocking, disappointing, outrageous,” and “a warning.”

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Major labels tried to have it both ways. After initially suing for copyright infringement, Warner Music Group came to terms at the end of the year and signed agreements with both Suno and Udio, allowing these platforms to continue operating while giving the labels some licensing revenue. Spotify introduced AI disclosure standards, allowing artists to tag how they used AI in their creative process. Deezer went further, becoming the first streaming platform to explicitly tag fully AI-generated music and implement detection tools for platforms like Listen and Udio.

But here the music industry can’t compete while riding a tiger – AI music is growing rapidly, and it is eating away the work and revenue of human artists. Studies indicate that by 2028, approximately 25% of creators’ revenues are at risk, and this is potentially €4 billion. Another analysis predicted that musicians could lose up to 27% of their revenues within three years if a proper compensation system was not established. Currently, entirely AI-generated music represents only 0.5% of Deezer’s streams, but the trajectory is clear.

The market tells the story the industry doesn’t want to hear. The AI ​​music market was valued at $5.2 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach $60.44 billion by 2034, growing at about 28% annually. Revenue from AI-generated music alone is expected to boost the industry by 17.2% in 2025. This is not innovation on the margins, but instead a fundamental restructuring.

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The most surprising thing is how musicians are responding. They are using AI tools in their projects, such as mixing, mastering, generating beats, analyzing frequencies, and creating backing tracks. The casual ‘producer’ sitting in a parent’s living room can now expect to achieve professional-quality sound without booking time in an expensive studio or years of technical training. Whether that’s a salvation or a loss depends on who you ask.

The infiltration of generic AI into music-making marks a significant moment for an industry that is still recovering from the pandemic and struggling to fairly compensate artists in the streaming age. In response, platforms such as HumanAble emerged, which provide certification for human-composed music. This is a defensive inclination, an acceptance that the default assumption may soon be overturned. And that music will be considered AI-generated until proven otherwise.

What have they actually achieved?

So after a year of courtship with AI, what do Hollywood and music have to show for it?

For Hollywood and filmmakers, there are claims of increased efficiency in post-production, some cost savings on visual effects, faster script analysis, and a lot of bad PR. No AI-generated film has captured the cultural imagination. None of the AI ​​”actors” have given a performance that anyone will remember. The technology remains more promising than an actual product.

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For music, a real disruption with no apparent answer. AI tools have legitimately democratized music production, putting professional quality production and mixing within reach of anyone with a laptop. The streaming platform has integrated AI recommendations that boost discovery. The tools work, people use them, and they’re changing how music is made. And millions of people around the world listened. Don’t forget the existential dread. If AI can create impressive songs in seconds, what will happen to human musicians who spent years developing their craft?

The real question no one wants to answer

Here’s what neither industry wants to face – that they’ve spent 2025 trying to have it both ways, but they’re not winning. They want the efficiency, cost savings, and creative shortcuts of AI, without acknowledging that these tools fundamentally jeopardize the human labor that makes their industries possible.

When Disney invests a billion in OpenAI while SAG-AFTRA fights to protect actors from AI replacement, there is no contradiction to manage. When Warner Music Group signs licensing deals with the same AI platforms its artists fear will make them obsolete, that’s not practical adaptation, it’s actively financing the disintegration of its own talent pool. Corporations will only look after their own interests. Humans don’t often appear on that list. good luck with that.

Vishal Mathur is Technology Editor at HT. Tech Tonic is a weekly column that looks at the impact of personal technology on the way we live our lives, and vice versa. The views expressed are personal.