„Mir wurde die Weihnachtsstimmung ruiniert“: McDonald’s entfernt KI-generierte Werbung nach Gegenreaktion
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/11/mcdonalds-removes-ai-generated-christmas-ad-advert-backlash
„Mir wurde die Weihnachtsstimmung ruiniert“: McDonald’s entfernt KI-generierte Werbung nach Gegenreaktion
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/11/mcdonalds-removes-ai-generated-christmas-ad-advert-backlash
29 Kommentare
Part article (go to article for more details) :
McDonald’s says it has removed an AI-generated Christmas advertisement in the Netherlands after it was criticised online.
The ad, titled “the most terrible time of the year”, depicts scenes of Christmas chaos, with Santa caught in a traffic jam and a gift-laden Dutch cyclist slipping in the snow. And the message? Retreat to a McDonald’s restaurant until January and ride out the festive season.
But the generative AI advertisement from the Big Mac maker’s Netherlands division sparked a flurry of criticism on social media.
Good, fuck them
Even without the AI it’d be awful.
Not a fan of some of the over the top AI FPS fragments but part of the ad was fine.
I am not defending McDonalds or this AI garbage in any way shape or form but… the person in the article who claims a McDonalds commercial ruined the season for them, they need to get an ad blocker or maybe just stop watching TV for awhile because if a dumb ad can have that strong of an effect on you, it’s not healthy to watch them.
If only Coca Cola did the same instead of doubling down on creepy slop
The ad wasn’t good by any means but it definitely didn’t ruin my Christmas spirit… if you watched it on loop for a week I could see it being an issue
I thought everything related to AI gets criticism nowadays
Nothing says family and humanity like a computer having diarrhea and calling it an ad
Just like their brand – Cheap, soulless, and somewhere someone isn’t being paid enough.
They are lacking in courage and conviction. They need to double down on AI generated commercials.
Its consistent with the brand – they sell slop food, why not slop commercials.
One of the big problems I had with it was that it was a Dutch ad that showed American homes. Split level homes like that don’t exist here and colonials are extremely rare.
What’s wild, is there are seriously tons of of AI ads on YouTube and even TV right now but the ones that are lazy are the ones taking the backlash. I’ve even seen a local news spot using AI and yep…nothing on it, it was really good and I had to really focus to see where they messed up (the „fly over“ shot was in a very very restricted area of our city for drones) but it’s on all day down here.
If McDonald’s was able to ruin your Christmas spirit, I think you probably need to do something different with your life.
Your CEO doesn’t need 138 million. Lower your prices.
McDonald’s is literally garbage food that they charge you more for each and every year. It isn’t even affordable anymore. Go somewhere else
I”m ¿£0v$¥~ing it!!
>Melanie Bridge, the chief executive of the Sweetshop Films, the company which made the ad, defended its use of AI in a post on LinkedIn.
>“It’s never about replacing craft, it’s about expanding the toolbox. The vision, the taste, the leadership … that will always be human,” she said.
>“And here’s the part people don’t see: the hours that went into this job far exceeded a traditional shoot. Ten people, five weeks, full-time.”
So you made people work even harder/longer than usual to create something that’s demonstrably worse by every conceivable metric and resulted in a very predictable PR nightmare. Not to mention the fact that they did obviously „replace the craft“ of actors, musicians, film crew, etc. What a ridiculous self-own.
But Coke is still airing their AI slop ad from last year.
Ahaha it’s so cute and fun cause the world is falling apart but you can always count on a $15 Big Mac to brighten your day.
Cool, now do CocaCola.
Why hasn’t this happened to the Coka-Cola ads. I seriously hate those, they used to feel magical, now it feels empty.
AI or not it’s hard to bet on going AGAINST the magic of Christmas
It’s crazy to me that one of their defenses of the commercial was that it took more time and more people to make this AI generated slop then it would have taken for real people to just go out and shoot a commercial. Like why didn’t you just do that then?
Stop promoting this article. The article is the ad.
Your Christmas spirit being ruined by a McDonalds commercial using AI is so fucking funny to me. It’s a fucking ad for a multinational burger chain people lol
Honestly it’s not the AI angle… that didn’t bother me. It’s not even the ‚most terrible time of the year‘ angle because that has enough satire to be mildly amusing – it’s the idea that McDonalds is a place of warmth and refuge. The food is still overpriced junk that at best can be someone’s idea of comfort/convenience food. The locations have no specific warmth or persona anymore – the nearest one to me has a few tables but renovated to be mostly open floor space with a few ordering kiosks and the counter and is all sterile colours. It’s not really welcoming and I suspect almost all of its business is couriers and drive-thru. Hard to pitch that kind of place as a comforting refuge where you can hide out from the stress of life or spend more than an uncomfortable 15 – 20 minutes in at one of the few tables to finish and leave – ain’t nobody hanging out there.
Eventually nobody can even tell if it’s AI generated. Crazy times ahead.
Yall are such grinches. Its a fun ad. Nothing more. Nobody got hurt nobody got robbed. Would you rather its all happy cheer? I dont get it. If anything this backlash reminds me why its defnibitly not “the happiest time of the year”