Event aims to unpack chaos caused by AI slop

ARU hosts first academic symposium dedicated to AI content and brain rot

2025-12-02

(Press-News.org) Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) will host the world’s first academic symposium dedicated to addressing the impact of “brain rot” and “AI slop”.

Taking place on Friday, 5 December, the event builds on research from ARU’s Centre for Media, Arts, and Creative Industries, and delegates from 23 countries will take part either online or in person at ARU in Cambridge, England.

Brain rot, named Oxford’s Word of the Year in 2024, refers to the “deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state, especially viewed as the result of overconsumption of material … considered to be trivial or unchallenging.”

Closely linked and often fuelling brain rot is AI slop, which was recently chosen as Macquarie Dictionary’s Word of the Year for 2025.

AI slop describes the flood of low-quality, AI-generated content, often riddled with errors, with recent viral examples including the surreal “Shrimp Jesus” images and videos of trampolining rabbits. It is often produced at scale by content farms to manipulate algorithms and drive online revenue.

Rather than dismissing these trends as frivolous fads, the ARU symposium will examine how they are actually reshaping art, media, politics and even the internet itself.

Discussions will focus on the psychological and societal effects of consuming mass-produced, low-quality content and what this means for the future as generative AI tools become increasingly widespread.

Dr Tina Kendall, Associate Professor in Film & Media at Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), said: “We’re excited to host the first academic symposium devoted to the phenomena of brain rot and AI slop – trends that have grown out of the development and spread of generative AI use across social media.

“The term AI slop encompasses widespread concerns about the easy availability of AI tools and the torrent of low-quality, misleading content they produce. This cultural detritus is reshaping what we see online and how we trust information.

“The concept isn’t entirely new – we’ve had content such as chain letters and spam for many years. However, the scale and speed of AI-generated material is unprecedented. It’s already influencing culture, work and even democracy, with ‘AI slopaganda’ raising serious questions about misinformation and decision-making.

“Throughout the day, speakers will explore what brain rot and AI slop mean for users, how content farms produce it and how platforms amplify it, and even the hidden dangers, such as the United Nations warning of the environmental costs of this content.”

The Centre for Media, Arts & Creative Technologies symposium – Brain Rot, AI Slop, and the Enshittification of the Internet – is free and open to the public and can be attended in person at ARU’s Cambridge campus or online.

It will be followed by a launch event for Dr Kendall’s latest book Entertained or Else: Boredom and Networked Media (Bloomsbury), which explores the role of boredom in media consumption. This event is also free to attend.

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Event aims to unpack chaos caused by AI slop

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