As we approach the anniversary of ChatGPT’s explosion onto the global stage, it might be time for an update of the impact of AI on the advertising industry.

I’m writing this about 30 seconds after reading about Dentsu’s launch of the Artificial Client, “an AI experiment that generates feedback on creative work from three fictional client personas—the ‘Ruthless Critic’, ‘Idealistic Dreamer’, and the ‘Confused Creative’. You can upload a brand design, UI design or TV script and have all three comment on your work.”

Before you despair/panic/rejoice, Dentsu says the results are “more goofy than serious”, but it also says that this experiment points to such future uses as “testing real creative work”.

As we have seen so often in the emergence of AI, if you were silently smug that your job would not be affected by its potential dominance, you were invariably wrong. I don’t know how many clients felt that their specialised, nuanced contribution to the advertising process could never be affected by AI, but I imagine Dentsu’s invention will now give them pause for thought.