🍜 McDonald pulls its Christmas ad after backlash..

From cursed Christmas ads to paywalled intelligence to an AI giant catching its breath the chaos is immaculate...

December 11, 2025

Welcome, Noodle Networkers.

AI ruined Christmas, Meta discovered capitalism, and OpenAI is suddenly the kid who didn’t study for the final. Grab a snack. McDonald’s Netherlands pulled its AI Christmas ad after the internet roasted it alive. The ad looked like Rudolph wandered into a glitchy fever dream and customers said it felt “emotionally cooked by a robot microwave.” It was deleted faster than a McFlurry melts 🎄 Meta is pivoting from open source to full profit mode. After years of shouting “AI for everyone,” they quietly switched to “AI for everyone who pays.” The new strategy is less community cookbook and more grandma’s secret recipe locked in a vault 🔁 And OpenAI is facing trouble as it slips in the AI race. A year ago they were the main character now Google is speed running upgrades and OpenAI is looking around like “wait slow down I cannot breathe” ⚠️

From cursed Christmas ads to paywalled intelligence to an AI giant catching its breath the chaos is immaculate. Let’s dig in.

In today’s AI digest:

  • McDonald’s Netherlands pulls its AI Christmas ad after backlash 🎄

  • Meta pivots from open source to profit driven AI 🔁

  • OpenAI faces trouble as it slips in the AI race ⚠️

Read time: 5 minutes

WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY

McDonald

(source: BBC)

🎄 The Digest: McDonald’s Netherlands tried to drop a quirky AI Christmas ad and the internet responded with the enthusiasm of someone finding a cold fry at the bottom of the bag. After a wave of backlash, the ad disappeared faster than a McFlurry machine breaking.

Key Details:

😬 AI Christmas Cheer Turns Into A Holiday Horror Show
The ad showed chaotic Christmas scenes that looked like AI tried to recreate Home Alone after reading only half the script. Viewers were so unsettled that comments were shut off within hours.

👀 People Called It Soulless And A Little Demonic
Critics said the visuals felt like a cursed holiday card from the uncanny valley. One reviewer said it looked like Christmas was being celebrated inside a malfunctioning snow globe.

🎬 Not As Easy As Plug It In And Pray
Despite being AI generated, the production team admitted it took weeks of tweaking and endless fixes which makes the backlash sting even more. Turns out AI still cannot automate taste.

🌐 Another Lesson In AI Marketing Gone Wrong
Brands keep learning the same painful lesson people want holiday warmth not digitally generated chaos that looks like Santa is being held hostage inside a GPU.

Why It Matters: AI ads can be fun but this showed that without human warmth things get weird fast. The next time a brand thinks AI can handle Christmas storytelling someone in the room needs to ask have we considered hiring literally anyone with a pulse. Somewhere an AI model is wondering why everyone hated its holiday movie and a McDonald’s executive is whispering never again into a stack of napkins.

(source: Bloomberg)

🔁 The Digest: Meta is shifting from open source champion to profit powered AI machine. After years of bragging about free models for the world the company is now quietly sliding the credit card terminal across the table.

Key Details:

🗝️ From Free Llama To Paywall Alpaca
Meta once released Llama as a gift to the open source community. Now its next big model nicknamed Avocado is expected to sit behind a license fee which is a polite way of saying the free buffet is closed.

💼 Openness Was A Growth Hack
Insiders admit open sourcing was great for recruiting users and goodwill. Once everyone adopted the ecosystem Meta decided it was time to switch from sharing to charging which is basically the oldest move in tech.

📉 Open Source Is Falling Behind
Industry analysts say open models now lag top commercial ones by a year or more. Meta sees no reason to give away something it can sell especially when training costs look like defense budgets.

🎯 Aiming For Control And Cash Flow
Closed models mean tighter guardrails predictable revenue and fewer surprises like someone using your “open” AI to build a pizza ordering robot that goes viral before your own app does.

Why It Matters: This marks the end of Meta’s feel good open source era and the beginning of its “we would like to be paid now” era. Developers may miss the freedom researchers may miss the access and Meta will not miss the revenue.
Somewhere Mark Zuckerberg is probably explaining that the spirit of openness still lives on but only during business hours.

OpenAI

(source: TheAtlantic)

⚠️ The Digest: OpenAI once looked like the untouchable final boss of the AI world. Now it is starting to look more like a character in a speedrun stumbling on level three while everyone else sprints past. Between a company wide code red rivals stealing the spotlight and some confidence wobbling OpenAI is officially in its uh oh era.

Key Details:

🚨 A Code Red That Actually Means Code Red
Sam Altman paused multiple new projects to focus entirely on fixing ChatGPT’s performance. When a tech company says they are “reallocating resources” it usually means panic. This time they skipped the euphemisms.

📉 Rivals Are Zooming Ahead
Google’s Gemini 3 is scoring big benchmark wins and attracting users fast. It is like OpenAI showed up to the race in sneakers and Google arrived with rocket skates.

💸 Spending Like A Startup With Billion Dollar Bills
Compute costs are exploding and revenue is not catching up. Investors love moonshots until they realize the rocket fuel bill could buy a small country.

⚠️ Public Trust Is Getting Shaky
Some recent models and apps have disappointed or caused backlash. When your AI video tool becomes trending for the wrong reasons you know the vibes are off.

Why It Matters: The AI throne shifts faster than a GPU overheats. OpenAI is still powerful but the aura of inevitability is cracking. If they cannot pull off a comeback moment this could be the part of the movie where the underdog rivals form a montage. Somewhere Sam Altman is probably staring at a wall of performance charts whispering okay time to do something cool again.

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AI Hacks & How-Tos

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1. Sign Up and Connect Your Email
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4. Track Your Reputation
Use the dashboard to check deliverability, spam score, inbox placement and domain reputation.
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Pro tip: Keep your sending volume consistent so inbox providers don’t get suspicious.

Trending AI Tools

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