The Only Way to Stop AI 'Art' in 2026 Is to Make It Uncool

Katelyn is a writer with CNET covering artificial intelligence, including chatbots, image and video generators. Her work explores how new AI technology is infiltrating our lives, shaping the content we consume on social media and affecting the people behind the screens. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in media and journalism. You can reach her at kchedraoui@cnet.com.

A hill I'm willing to die on: I don't consider content created entirely by an AI image or video generator "art."

This rule -- made by me, for me -- has occupied a lot of my brain space in 2025. Over the course of the year, we've gone from clunky, hallucination-ridden AI videos to clips that can be virtually indistinguishable from real videos. This year might seem like it's gone on forever, but the pace at ...