My buddy Alex dropped into my inbox with a screenshot that looked like it was beamed in from the future. “This AI tool is basically reading minds,” he typed. One algorithm, multiple predictions: the death of skinny jeans, the resurrection of vintage roller skates, an obscure Korean snack about to become the next global obsession. The kind of cultural prophecy that used to take rooms full of marketing executives is now condensed into a single interface.
Let me take you on a quick tour of trend manufacturing, circa 1950 to now. Remember those cigarette ads showing doctors recommending specific brands? That wasn’t “consumer insight” – that was pure, calculated trend creation. Mad Men wasn’t a TV show; it was a documentary about professional trend engineers. These guys didn’t discover trends. They invented them.
Consider the pet rock. In 1975, Gary Dahl literally sold rocks as pets and made millions. Was that a “natural” trend? Ha. That was marketing warfare, pure and simple. People didn’t wake up one-morning thinking, “You know what I need? A rock.” Someone calculated exactly how to make that seem desirable.
What AI is doing now is essentially the same game, just with quantum computing instead of martini lunches. The difference is scale and speed. Before, creating a trend took months of focus groups and media buys. Now, it takes an algorithm 17 minutes and a post on X.
Think about influencer marketing – which, by the way, predates social media. Celebrity endorsements have always been about manufacturing desire. When Michael Jordan made everyone want Air Jordans, was that a “natural” trend? Nope. That was a meticulously engineered cultural phenomenon. AI is just doing that job with more math and fewer courtside appearances.
The real innovation isn’t that AI can create trends. It’s that AI can weaponize cultural insights with terrifying precision. Traditional marketing has always been about understanding human desire – AI is turning that understanding into a surgical strike.
This doesn’t mean we should hit the panic button. Every technological breakthrough comes with complexity. The same tools that can map cultural conversations can also misfire spectacularly. The difference now is that we’re watching the manipulation happen in real-time, with unprecedented transparency.
What’s fascinating isn’t that AI can shape trends but how it’s pulling back the curtain on a process that’s always existed. We’re not suddenly being manipulated – we’re just seeing the machinery more clearly than ever before.
Coca-Cola didn’t become a global brand by waiting for people to get thirsty. They created the concept of what being “refreshed” means. Apple didn’t discover our desire for sleek technology; they rewired our entire relationship with devices. AI is just the next evolutionary step in that cultural programming.
AI isn’t breaking some sacred covenant of authenticity. It’s completing the project that marketing started decades ago – turning human desire into a predictable, manipulatable system. The only difference is that now, the manipulation comes with an algorithm instead of a slick pitch.
So the next time someone tells you AI is just “understanding” trends, laugh. Then ask yourself: Who’s really in control here? The algorithm that knows what you’ll want next, or you?
Eric Wing writes about tech and culture from the perspective of someone who knows the most dangerous technologies are the ones that seem helpful.
