2025 Pop Culture Predictions

Summary

Pop Culture Happy Hour: 2025 Pop Culture Predictions – Detailed Summary

Introduction to Predictions Segment

In the December 30, 2024 episode of NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour, titled "2025 Pop Culture Predictions," hosts Linda Holmes, Glen Weldon, Stephen Thompson, and Aisha Harris engage in their annual tradition of forecasting the trends, events, and shifts expected to shape the pop culture landscape in the upcoming year. This episode delves into the accuracy of their previous predictions, explores new forecasts, and provides insightful discussions on various facets of entertainment, media, and technology.

Review of Last Year's Predictions

Stephen Thompson’s 2024 Predictions

Stephen Thompson embarked on the episode by revisiting his 2024 predictions, offering a candid assessment of his forecasting accuracy.

• Best Picture: Thompson had boldly predicted that Oppenheimer would win Best Picture at the Oscars, a prediction that proved accurate. “Oppenheimer did win Best Picture. I think we can agree. That was a huge shock. And I'm a genius,” he remarked at [02:57].

• Album of the Year: He also forecasted that Taylor Swift’s Midnights would clinch Album of the Year at the Grammys, a prediction that came true. “Midnight's winning album of the year. No one would ever think to predict a win at the Grammys for Taylor Swift,” Thompson noted [04:33].

• Super Bowl Outcome: Thompson predicted the San Francisco 49ers would triumph over the Baltimore Ravens. However, the 49ers lost to the Kansas City Chiefs, marking this prediction as incorrect.

• Rihanna’s Album Release: He anticipated no new album from Rihanna in 2024, which held true. “Rihanna did not put out an album,” he confirmed [04:26].

• Trend Towards Shorter Hit Songs: Thompson foresaw the continued rise of shorter songs, influenced by TikTok trends, predicting that two of the five biggest Billboard hits in 2024 would be under two minutes. This prediction did not materialize as the top hits did not follow this trend.

Despite some misses, Thompson highlighted the successes in his predictions, celebrating his accurate foresight while humorously acknowledging his inaccuracies.

Aisha Harris’s 2024 Predictions

Aisha Harris provided a reflective analysis of her 2024 predictions:

• Box Office Expectations: Harris predicted that no movie would surpass the $1 billion mark worldwide, a forecast that was ultimately incorrect. “Inside Out 2 and Deadpool and Wolverine were in the top two spots of this year. They both crossed the $1 billion mark,” she admitted [10:31].

Despite the inaccuracy, Harris expressed satisfaction with her overall understanding of the industry's dynamics, acknowledging the resilience of major franchises.

Linda Holmes’s 2024 Predictions

Linda Holmes shared her evaluations of the previous year's forecasts:

• Jesse Armstrong’s New Series: Holmes had predicted that Jesse Armstrong, creator of Succession, would announce a new series. This prediction fell flat, as no significant announcements were made regarding Armstrong’s involvement in new projects. Instead, Armstrong took on an executive producer role for HBO’s The Michaela Cole Show, which Holmes noted [14:12].

• Reality Show Lawsuit Settlement: She also predicted a major settlement or verdict in a reality show lawsuit, specifically referencing Love is Blind. Harris confirmed this prediction, highlighting the National Labor Relations Board’s ruling that participants are employees, leading to significant legal and operational implications for reality TV productions [15:00].

Glen Weldon’s 2024 Predictions

Glen Weldon revisited his 2024 forecasts with a critical eye:

• AI-Written Novel: Weldon predicted that a first-time novelist would release a critically acclaimed novel written by AI, sparking a literary hoax. While not exact, he mentioned a Chinese novel titled The Land of Machine Memories by Professor Shengyang, which garnered attention, though it did not receive widespread recognition or major literary awards [21:49].

2025 Predictions

Stephen Thompson’s 2025 Forecasts

Building on last year's experiences, Stephen Thompson outlined his predictions for 2025:

1. Oscar Best Picture: Thompson predicts that Wicked will take home the Best Picture Oscar, considering the Oscars' tendency to factor in box office success [07:49].

2. Grammys Album of the Year: He anticipates Billie Eilish’s album Hit Me Hard and Soft will win Album of the Year, potentially sparking debates on social media [07:38].

3. Super Bowl Outcome: Thompson forecasts the Buffalo Bills will defeat the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl, dismissing the Detroit Lions fans humorously [07:38].

4. Rihanna’s Album Release: Contrary to his previous prediction, Thompson now expects Rihanna to release a new album in 2025, hoping for a positive outcome [07:10].

5. Rise of K-Pop: He foresees a significant year for K-Pop, especially with BTS returning from hiatus and topping the Billboard Hot 100 for over 12 weeks, despite criticizing the expected lyrical content [07:10].

Thompson underscores his commitment to bold and specific predictions, embracing both the potential successes and controversies they may incite.

Aisha Harris’s 2025 Forecasts

Aisha Harris presents a more cynical outlook for the upcoming year, focusing on corporate leadership shifts:

1. Disney’s CEO Position: Harris predicts Bob Iger will extend his tenure as Disney’s CEO beyond the initial extension through 2026, leveraging Disney’s strong financial performance and strategic decisions [12:30].

2. Warner Brothers Discovery Leadership: She also forecasts the ousting or resignation of David Zaslav, CEO of Warner Brothers Discovery, speculating on internal company dynamics and performance [12:30].

Harris’s predictions reflect her keen observation of corporate trends and leadership influences within major entertainment conglomerates.

Linda Holmes’s 2025 Forecasts

Linda Holmes offers her predictions with a blend of optimism and realism:

1. Lorne Michaels’s Retirement: Holmes anticipates serious discussions about Lorne Michaels retiring from Saturday Night Live (SNL). She envisions a period where succession plans will be crucial, given Michaels’s long-standing influence and the evolving nature of the show [18:00].

2. Jesse Armstrong’s New Series: While acknowledging her previous misprediction, Holmes remains hopeful that Armstrong will announce a new series, driven by his success with Succession [14:12].

Holmes emphasizes the enduring impact of influential figures in television and the necessity of strategic planning for continuity and innovation.

Glen Weldon’s 2025 Forecasts

Glen Weldon approaches his predictions with a hopeful perspective on AI’s future in creative writing:

1. AI Writing Roadblocks: Weldon predicts a plateau in the acceptance and utility of generative AI in creative writing. He believes that the over-reliance on AI for functional writing tasks may lead to its diminishing usefulness, as the lack of human nuance and emotion becomes apparent [22:54].

Weldon’s forecast highlights the tension between technological advancement and the irreplaceable value of human creativity in the arts.

Group Discussion and Reactions

Throughout the episode, the hosts engage in lively discussions, reflecting on the nature of predictions and the unpredictability inherent in pop culture trends.

• On Stephen’s Predictions: The group commends Thompson’s accuracy regarding Oppenheimer and Taylor Swift, while humorously dissecting his misses. Glen highlights the importance of specificity in predictions, appreciating Thompson’s boldness [04:21].

• On Aisha’s Predictions: Despite the inaccuracy regarding box office earnings, the team acknowledges Harris’s insightful understanding of the film industry’s challenges, particularly the reliance on major franchises [10:50].

• On Linda’s Predictions: The hosts express empathy over the unfulfilled expectations surrounding Jesse Armstrong, yet recognize the validity of her reality show lawsuit prediction [16:31].

• On Glen’s Predictions: The team appreciates Weldon’s forward-thinking approach to AI’s role in literature, even as they discuss the practical hurdles in realizing such scenarios [22:43].

Insights on AI and Creative Industries

A significant portion of the conversation centers on the intersection of AI and creative industries. Glen Weldon articulates a concern that generative AI may undermine the quality and authenticity of creative writing, advocating for the preservation of human touch in artistic endeavors [24:32]. Conversely, the group acknowledges the pervasive use of AI in task-oriented writing, pondering its long-term implications on employment and creative integrity [25:15].

Linda Holmes adds to this discourse by speculating on the technological limitations of AI, suggesting that the degradation of AI-generated content could challenge its sustained acceptance [26:09]. The hosts collectively emphasize the irreplaceable value of human creativity, debating the balance between efficiency and artistic expression.

Conclusion

As the episode wraps up, the hosts express enthusiasm for future discussions and invite listeners to engage with their predictions through social media. The conversation underscores the perennial fascination with forecasting pop culture trends, blending humor, critical analysis, and genuine curiosity about the future.

Notable Quotes:

• Linda Holmes [01:54]: “Nobody can predict what the future holds, but that doesn't stop us from trying.”

• Stephen Thompson [04:33]: “Oppenheimer did win Best Picture. I think we can agree. That was a huge shock. And I'm a genius.”

• Aisha Harris [12:30]: “I feel like [David Zaslav’s] days are numbered. That's just me.”

• Glen Weldon [22:54]: “There is a kind of writing that just checks boxes. But it always does more than checks a box.”

• Linda Holmes [26:34]: “If the way you're using cover letters in your business doesn't recognize the difference between an AI cover letter and not, then you probably don't need them.”

This episode of Pop Culture Happy Hour offers a comprehensive exploration of the hosts' predictions for 2025, blending retrospective analysis with forward-looking insights. Their discussions provide listeners with a nuanced understanding of the factors influencing pop culture, from corporate leadership shifts to technological advancements in AI.

Transcript

[Stephen Thompson]

Hey, it's Stephen Thompson. It is almost the end of the year, and this is the season when NPR comes to you as a nonprofit news organization to ask for your support. Maybe you're already an NPR supporter and if so, thank you so much. But if you've never given to public media before or not in a while, please consider it now because supporting public radio is a great way to express your values. You want to stay informed about what's going on in your community and around the world. You want to know where to turn for information you can trust and to hear hear perspectives that challenge your opinions. And believe me, I get it. Sometimes you want to tune out from the news and just hear a really cool story. NPR gives you that space to experience a little more joy, too. Our team here at Pop Culture Happy Hour has loved bringing you conversations about everything from our favorite YouTube rabbit holes to pop culture pumpkin spice lattes in 2024. And together we can do even more in 2025. The easiest way to support Pop Culture Happy Hour and stations across the country is to sign up for npr. It's a recurring donation that gets you special perks for more than 25 NPR podcasts like sponsor free listening, bonus episodes, behind the scenes content, and even exclusive and discounted items from the NPR Shop and the NPR Wine Club. It only takes a few minutes to sign up and you can do it right now. @plus.npr.org we love keeping you company with smart, fun and, yes, sometimes deeply silly conversations about all corners of the pop culture universe. And we simply could not do it without you. Thank you again for being a critical part of the public media community. Join [e-mail].

[Linda Holmes]

Nobody can predict what the future holds, but that doesn't stop us from trying.

[Stephen Thompson]

Trying, that is, to predict what will happen in the world of pop culture in 2025. We do it every year. So we'll look back on our predictions for 2024 and see how things turned out. I'm Stephen Thompson.

[Linda Holmes]

And I'm Linda Holmes. It's predictions time once again on Pop Culture Happy Hour from npr. Joining us today are our fellow Pop Culture Happy Hour hosts, Aisha Harris. Hello, Aisha.

[Aisha Harris]

Hello, Linda.

[Linda Holmes]

And Glen Weldon. Hello, Glenn.

[Glen Weldon]

Hey, pal.

[Linda Holmes]

I am so happy to see everybody. This is always one of my favorite days of the year. We are doing predictions today and I am going to start with Steven. I'm going to start with you. Before I take your prediction for the upcoming year, we are going to look back at your prediction for this year. Must be yes we must. This is accountability journalism. All right, go ahead.

[Stephen Thompson]

So I'm going to say that Oppenheimer wins Best Picture, basically goes wire to wire. I'm gonna say that Taylor Swift's Midnights wins album of the year because the Grammys love Taylor Swift and never change. I am going to say that the 49ers win the super bowl over the Ravens. I'm gonna say that Rihanna does not put out an album in 2024, because if I'm gonna be wrong, I might as well get a new Rihanna album out of it. And I am going to say I've noticed a trend that I think will continue and accelerate in 2024, and that is the rise of ever shorter hit songs. I think the tiktokification of the pop charts and the rise of artists like Pink Panthers, who really specialize in short form songwriting, I think the line between song and fragment is going to get blurrier and blurrier in 2024 to the point where the metric I'm looking at is that two of the five biggest songs of 2024 as defined by Billboard magazine, I'm going to say that two of the five biggest songs of 2024 will be shorter than two minutes long.

[Linda Holmes]

You know what I love about this prediction? Bold. Stephen, you made this prediction a year ago, and it was bold and specific. How did it turn out?

[Stephen Thompson]

Okay, so I got a few of these right. Rihanna did not put out an album.

[Glen Weldon]

That's the only one I know about. Our interests in pop culture do not overlap. So that was the only one I was sure got wrong.

[Stephen Thompson]

Well, Oppenheimer did win Best Picture. I think we can agree. That was a huge shock. And I'm a genius. Nobody saw that one coming. Ditto, Midnight's winning album of the year. No one would ever think to predict a win at the Grammys for Taylor Swift. That never happens. But then You've got the 49ers. They were in the Super Bowl. They lost to the Chiefs, not the Ravens. That's basically three out of four, but mostly layups. And no, two of the five biggest songs of 2024, we're not under two minutes long. That just flat out did not happen. Did not come close to happening. I thought Pink Panthers was going to have a huge year. She has a lot of short, kind of fragmented, TikTok friendly songs. And then she basically took 2024 off, which good for her. I want to play a short clip of audio from this past February, and nobody outside NPR has ever heard this clip of audio before. After the Super Bowl. A week after the Grammy Awards, we had Chapel Roan at the Tiny Desk. So with each Tiny Desk concert, there's a part that viewers at home don't see and where the show's producer gives a quick intro to get people warmed up. And because I booked Chapel Roan's show literally five months earlier, by the way, we booked these things ages in advance. I got to introduce her. Now, the sound is not great. We don't air the intros. It's not, you know, mixed or whatever. But I wanted to play this clip of something I said roughly a month, month and a half after we aired our predictions episode. One thing that I love about having this Tiny Dust concert on this day, right at the end of that sprint, is it feels like the 2025 Grammy campaign is kicking off right here and now. I play this clip for two reasons. Three. One is to brag.

[Linda Holmes]

I was just gonna say. I think it's mostly that one.

[Glen Weldon]

I was gonna say 75%.

[Stephen Thompson]

A no. 2 is to show just how easily on this show, I could have simply sat here and predicted Chapel Roan is gonna break big in 2024, to the point where she's gonna be a big part of the Grammy conversation. I would have looked like an actual genius. I booked the show in September of 2023. That prediction was right there. The other reason I play this clip is to demonstrate that I have made one accurate prediction in my entire life.

[Aisha Harris]

Okay, but you say you could have picked it, so why didn't you, like, you put your eggs in, like, 8 million other baskets and that wasn't one of them. So are you sure? I mean, yes. Foresight. Yes. You had the finger on the pulse. I will give you that, Steven. But you didn't.

[Linda Holmes]

I don't know if this should count.

[Stephen Thompson]

I'm not asking for it to count. I'm merely pointing out that I am, every once in a while, I am right about something. And so when we.

[Linda Holmes]

He's not trying to win, he's just self soothing.

[Aisha Harris]

Sure.

[Linda Holmes]

You did great. I think you did great. Honestly, you got several things right, and nobody, nobody can fault your prescience when you booked Chapel Roan in September of 2023. Come on, man.

[Aisha Harris]

This is true. In fact, to be fair to you and to our entire tiny desk, that tiny desk is part of the reason why she broke so big. So hats off to you, Bradley.

[Stephen Thompson]

Gotta give Olivia Rodrigo an assist. I think opening for Olivia Rodrigo on tour at the same time she was playing that tiny desk.

[Aisha Harris]

Take your kudos, man. Take it all right, take it.

[Linda Holmes]

Take the win. Take the win. All right. Thank you, Steven. That is last year's prediction. What is this coming up, year's prediction predictions.

[Glen Weldon]

What are your six predictions, Steven?

[Stephen Thompson]

I'm going to do a little bundle. I always do a little bundle. I'm going to say the Oscars take box office into consideration and give best picture to Wicked. The Grammys always take box office into consideration. I think they're gonna give album of the year to neither Taylor Swift nor Beyonce. Instead, the trophy's gonna go to Hit Me Hard and Soft by Billie Eilish, which will make a lot of people very performatively mad on social media. For the Super Bowl, I'm gonna go with Bills over Eagles because Detroit Lions fans can never be allowed to have nice things. I'm gonna say Rihanna will drop a new album because something good has to happen. And finally, 2024 was quietly a very good year for K pop music and fans of K pop music. I'm hereby predicting that K pop has a very big 2025 as BTS returns from its pre planned hiatus and releases a song. Now here comes the metric that tops the Billboard Hot 100 for 12 plus weeks.

[Linda Holmes]

Bold.

[Stephen Thompson]

I predict that that song's lyrics will be deeply insipid and that I will love that song to the ends of the earth and defend it, possibly even here on this show. So every single one of these things is gonna happen in 2025. Ever since Chapel Road and played the tiny Desk, I've been on a roll.

[Glen Weldon]

Bold, specific, and probably wrong. This is what I love about you songs.

[Linda Holmes]

It's absolutely true. You give yourself an actual target to hit. And those of us who are, as you will see, somewhat mushier in our predictions.

[Stephen Thompson]

I'm all about rigor, my friends.

[Linda Holmes]

Absolutely appreciate and value your rigor. All right, thank much, Stephen Thompson, Aisha Harris, we're going to go to you next. Let us hear about last year's prediction.

[Aisha Harris]

So for my 2024 prediction, I'm going to be a little nervy here and actually put a number on this. I'm going to predict that for the first time since 2007, 2020 accepted. Because 2020 was the year basically nothing made sense. No movie is going to cross the $1 billion mark worldwide. So I put a number on it. I was not squishy and I was wrong, which I think we can say is maybe good for movie theaters to some extent. So this is not a prediction I was making in hopes that it didn't happen. I just Felt like the winds were changing and that this was possible. And you know, I was wrong. And you know what? I'm happy I was wrong. Granted, I wasn't like a hu. Well, I didn't see one of these movies and the other one I was. I enjoyed enough. But, you know, sequels. Sequels, people. This is all that's in the top. Top 10.

[Linda Holmes]

What. What are they?

[Stephen Thompson]

Joker, Folie.

[Glen Weldon]

Adieu. Oh, God.

[Aisha Harris]

Oh, God. Actually, no, surprisingly, Joker was not. It did not make that much Money. Inside Out 2 and Deadpool and Wolverine were in the top two spots of this year. They both crossed the $1 billion mark. And Despicable Me 4 came close. So, yeah, I was wrong, but for good reason.

[Glen Weldon]

I don't know if this bodes well for cinema. I don't know if it bodes well for the art form, but it certainly bodes well for theaters and for ip and let's. Boy, IP is a scrappy little thing. It needs all the help it can get.

[Linda Holmes]

You know, people are still willing to go to theaters, and I think, on balance, that's a good thing. Although I agree with you that if I was going to pick a bunch of movies to make a billion dollars, I wouldn't make them all sequels. But it is what it is. It is what it is. So, you know, that prediction did not come true, but I think what was in your heart was still preserved. Honestly.

[Stephen Thompson]

Well. And I think there's still a good piece of analysis and idea having.

[Linda Holmes]

Sure.

[Stephen Thompson]

In what Aisha was saying, which is that this is a struggling industry and that having the occasional kind of Barbenheimer slash the Thanksgiving weekend. We just had sometimes papers over a sense that it is. It's hard out there for original properties and movies that aren't gigantic events or like very, very reliable franchises like An Inside out or a Despicable Me. It's hard out there.

[Linda Holmes]

I agree with that. All right, so that was last year's prediction. What is this year's prediction?

[Aisha Harris]

Well, I am gonna go cynical here again. Well, somewhat cynical here again. And very, very specific. And I'm gonna be completely honest here. I don't know if either of these things will actually happen, but they're predictions, so who cares? I think that in 2025, Bob Iger is going to extend his CEO contract for Disney. As you may know, he stepped down as CEO and Bob Chapek took over. And then Iger came back because he just couldn't let go of the reins. But he has his contract extended through to the end of 2026. But I feel as though he's probably going to find a way to extend it past that. The other part of this is that David Zaslav, the Warner Brothers Discovery CEO, is going to be unceremoniously ousted or resigned from the company. Now, here are my reasonings. And as we've already noted, Disney had the two biggest movies of 2024. They were inside out and Deadpool and Wolverine. Part because of that, this year turned out better for Disney than they expected on the earnings front. And, you know, in fact, to the point where they actually did something that I've learned is unprecedented. Apparently, like this fall, they made the move to announce its earnings guidance for the next three years. Financial people, you can sort out what that means. Basically, it means, like, they're giving more information than they normally would because they feel confident that they are gonna be good for. And look, you could argue in the next few years, that could mean that, like, they're setting it up and now they feel comfortable passing on the reins to someone else who is not Bob Iger. It could also mean Bob Iger could be like, hey, we're doing great. Let's not rock the boat. You may recall that, you know, a few months ago, there was a New York Times expose that kind of detailed the entire sort of behind the scenes of the Switch. And Bob Iger, according to that article, did a lot to undermine Bob Chapek and set him up to fail. It doesn't paint a good picture of Iger as someone who wants to let go. That's why I think he's gonna, you know, stay around. Obviously, there are lots of factors here. Zaslav. I feel like his days are numbered. That's just me. So those are my predictions there.

[Glen Weldon]

Again, specific.

[Linda Holmes]

I like it like the specificity. Thank you very much, Aisha Harris. I feel it is important to save the best for last in this case, which means it will not be me. And that means next is me. And we are going to.

[Stephen Thompson]

I really didn't see where this was going.

[Aisha Harris]

Had us in the first half there.

[Linda Holmes]

We're going to hear my prediction for this past year, my predictions for 2024. I have two. Jesse Armstrong, who created Succession, will announce a new series. I just think with Succession over and everybody having loved it so much, it's just hard for me to believe that that guy is not going to get right back to work. So that's one. The other one is somebody is going to win. By which I mean either get a big verdict or get a big settlement in a reality show lawsuit. Yeah. So I will say this first. My favorite thing about the first prediction, the Jesse Armstrong prediction, is that you can hear Glenn making little noises in the background. It's like he knows I'm wrong. It's like he has seen the future and he knows that there's not going to be an announcement of a big Jesse Armstrong show, which there wasn't. The biggest news that I found about Jesse Armstrong this year is that he's going to be an executive producer on the next Michaela Cole show for hbo, which is an interesting thing. I don't know how involved he is. Right. Executive producer can mean anything from, you know, heavily involved to I attached my name and we don't always know exactly, you know, for support and development and stuff, and we don't always know. But no, there's no new big Jesse Armstrong show. Absolutely wrong. 0 out of 10 on that. In terms of the reality television business, for much of this year, the show Love is Blind has been mired in a variety of lawsuits and legal issues and things like that. They did settle a class action lawsuit with a bunch of contestants in May. More significantly, just recently, the National Labor Relations Board ruled that the contestants on Love is Blind are employees, which means that they are covered by labor law. And that develops a whole other set of obligations and things like that and is potentially, I think, more significant. So, yeah, I give myself definitely credit for the march to try to put some boundaries around what can be done by reality shows, which is kind of what you were.

[Stephen Thompson]

Which is what you were getting at.

[Linda Holmes]

It's not something where the earth has moved necessarily, especially since you never know what's ultimately going to come of that NLRB ruling and stuff like that. But for the time being, it is true that there has been some movement on this front. And I give myself credit for this.

[Glen Weldon]

Is where specifics get you in trouble. Because, yeah, the specifics were wrong, but the meaning, the prediction itself was spot on. I think that NLRB ruling is gonna be a big, big deal. I think it's gonna have repercussions for a long time.

[Aisha Harris]

Yeah.

[Linda Holmes]

Well, we shall see. We shall see. So that was last year's prediction, this year's prediction. You know, you may know if you listen to these episodes that there is a long history of Ayesha and I being of one mind when it comes to our predictions and resolutions and of a certain simpatico quality between what Aisha is thinking about and what I am thinking about. My prediction for 2025 is that we are going to start to hear more seriously about lorne Michaels retiring. SNL is doing its 50th. A few years ago, in an interview, he said maybe he wanted to stay around until the 50th. That seemed like maybe a good time to retire. He's 80 now. Very often people say something like that, and then they get there and they think, well, I still feel pretty good, and I'm actually not going to retire. But as I said, He's 80. Certainly he doesn't have to do it anymore. Certainly he could continue if he wanted to be kind of to have his fingers in all kinds of different pies without doing the job of being in charge of snl. But I do think you're going to, at the very least in 2025, start to hear about succession plans. Like, what is the plan? Because the fact that he's been there for so long, the fact that he started at the beginning of this show in 1975 and has only been gone for a brief period, that is considered to have been calamitous, which a lot of people assume like it was calamitous because you have to have him. I don't know if I necessarily agree with that. I also think the shape of that show has changed a lot in the last little while. There's a discussion of that show in Mo Ryan's book, Burn it down, that brings up some allegations of workplace issues. It's also kind of, you know, turned into this celebrity impressions kind of thing, even more than it kind of has been in the past. I think they are at a point where they got to figure out when he decides to stop doing this, do we just shut it down?

[Stephen Thompson]

They're not going to do that, which.

[Linda Holmes]

I can't imagine they will want to do. Or do we figure out what the heck is next and how different is it going to be versus are we just going to try to find somebody else to run it? And he looms so large that I have no idea what that future would look like. But I think they're going to start. You're gonna start to hear that they're trying to figure it out. At the very least.

[Aisha Harris]

I mean, whenever that happens, it's probably gonna be very much like what I remember at least, of Johnny Carson leaving, where it's just like month after month of let's track this and all these accolades and these parties and various specials surrounding Lauren. And then eventually, maybe we finally hear people talk about him, maybe in ways that he doesn't want to be talked about. But that seems very far in the future still.

[Stephen Thompson]

But in the meantime, Bette Midler is just gonna follow him around singing Wind Beneath My Wings at him.

[Linda Holmes]

Singing One More for the Road.

[Glen Weldon]

As hard as it is to imagine a future without Lorne Michaels, Imagine like an alternate world where Lorne Michaels never happened. What would the pop culture landscape look like without a Lorne Michaels in it? He just has his fingers in everything. So, yeah, great prediction. Solid prediction.

[Linda Holmes]

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. All right. I said I wanted to save the best for last. I was purely sucking up to Glenn. Glenn.

[Glen Weldon]

Okay, this is. This is gonna go pear shaped, I can tell.

[Linda Holmes]

Let us hear your prediction from last year.

[Glen Weldon]

In the year 2024, a novel will be released by a named publisher of literary fiction from a first time novelist. And it will receive critical praise and maybe win a literary award or two, or get nominated at least. And it will later be revealed to have been written by AI. Okay. It's been a long time since we had a literary hoax. That's my prediction. Now, there's a lot of obstacles here to have this happen because, you know, if it comes from a major publishing house. Well, a lot of media companies, NPR included, have, you know, written up these AI ethics guidelines. But they're guidelines, right? And I think a publishing company will want to drive a discourse which, granted, will be tiresome. It will be awful. You'll have some critics backtracking on their positive reviews and saying, I knew it all along. Maybe it won't be a novel. Maybe it'll be like a debut short story in the New Yorker. But we're due for this, right? I mean, it's gotta happen eventually. I don't know if it's gonna happen this year, but it's inevitable. Well, I mean, this kind of happened. As long as we're willing to slap a few asterisks on it.

[Aisha Harris]

We always are. This is predictions.

[Glen Weldon]

Yeah. Because in fairness, this didn't happen in 2024. It happened in 2023. It happened between the time we recorded that episode and the end of 2023. A Chinese novel called the Land of Machine Memories won second prize. And let me get this right. The fifth Jiangsu Popular Science and Science Fiction Competition.

[Stephen Thompson]

Now, no bigger in authority.

[Glen Weldon]

That may not sound like much to us, I'm gonna say, but it made national news in China. It was submitted by Shengyang, a professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing. It was one of 200 entries. So I think that counts. Now, if we're looking for a silver lining here, only three of the six judges voted for it, which is why it got second prize. One of the judges said he could tell it was AI because it lacked emotion. This is, you know, this is not a national award with international prestige. It didn't happen in 2024 and you know, it wasn't a major publishing house.

[Linda Holmes]

But you're, you're on the track though. Ye, I think you make a fair point. I think you make a fair point even if it wasn't like literally exactly what happened. All right, so what is your prediction for 2025?

[Glen Weldon]

Well, this one I'm going wildly off brand. I'm going to let Aisha be the cynical one because I am going to be downright naive Pollyanna, hopeful, wide eyed. I'm going to be Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm over here. And it also has to do with AI. I think the widespread acceptance of AI, of specifically generative AI like ChatGPT is going to hit a roadblock. I think the thing it has going for it right now is its usefulness. I mean, we're all professional writers, we don't use it, but every single one of our friends do every day in their lives at work. And I think it continues to be used for the kind of writing that I would call task oriented or functional. You know, cover letters, applications, grant proposals, technical manuals, any email you have to send that is, you know, has to do with procedures or systems. You know, so the reason people use it is because it's so efficient. They've convinced themselves that there's a kind of writing that is most efficient when it adheres to strict guidelines and formatting. And that's what computers can do. Right. I think what's going to happen is that people are going to begin to acknowledge that kind of writing was never really about adherence to guidelines and formatting, that there always a human voice was behind it and there needs to be. I think what we're doing now is producing final products that are so anodyne, so uniform, so generic that its usefulness, AI's usefulness is going to come into question. It's about a kind of writing that goes from being a chore to right to a to read. It's so featureless and indistinct. Here's why I think it's going to happen because of money. It's going to cease to offer any kind of meaningful guidance or distinction. Employers who are really the people who are requiring it are not going to get anything useful from COVID letters. They never did. But let's. It's going to be even worse.

[Linda Holmes]

Well, yeah, I think maybe one of the Things you're going to see is people deciding that they don't need those kinds of writing at all. This kind of use of AI for something like a cover letter, if you can produce it by AI and nobody can tell the difference, then you just don't. Maybe you don't need them at all.

[Glen Weldon]

Especially that gets compounded if it's costing employers time and money. And I realize I sound like I'm going to break into the brotherhood of man here, but I think we have to acknowledge that all writing, including technical writing, is a human endeavor 100%. It's a human skill. It's about communicating from one human mind to another human mind. And we should stop looking to machines to do the stuff that we humans find creative and satisfying and life affirming, writing and making art. Why are we farming out the fun stuff? That's the fun stuff.

[Stephen Thompson]

We're literally, we're taking all the joy and turning it into a mechanized. Oh, get me started.

[Aisha Harris]

Well, we're ferreting out the fun stuff because historically the fun stuff, unless you reach a very, very small piece of the 1%, it's not funded well. It's like we don't want to pay for that stuff. So it's true. It's true.

[Linda Holmes]

But I would also say, Glenn, I think the other thing that may become a roadblock is it is hard to tell right now how those things are going to be, how something like ChatGPT or any of the other generative ones are going to be affected as they start to eat themselves, as they start to devour their own. Like AI is just regurgitating letters that were also written by AI and at some point the product degrades. And I've read some interesting stuff about how what you can produce goes down in quality.

[Glen Weldon]

Yeah.

[Linda Holmes]

As the thing kind of starts to pollute its own training set. Right, exactly. So I do think there are some technological limitations that may, you know, go hand in hand with figuring out. It's not that I don't respect a beautiful cover letter. Believe me, I do. The point is if the way you're using cover letters in your business doesn't recognize the difference between an AI cover letter and not, then you probably don't need them.

[Glen Weldon]

You know, I mean, I think what I'm coming away with here is that there is a kind of writing that just checks boxes. Right. But it always does more than checks a box. I mean, that's the thing. I mean, and what's the measurement here? What's the metric here? Because this is pretty squishy. I think this is the squishiest of all predictions we've made. I don't think there's going to be something like in the Dune universe, there's a Butlerian jihad where there's a rise up against thinking machines. I think this is going to be not instantaneous, but we're steering a ship here. This is a process. You're going to see some big employer issuing a policy that discourages the use of AI in a specific situation. And then like steering a ship, it's just going to widen out and widen out and widen out. That's what I think you need to look for.

[Aisha Harris]

I mean, I hope that's true, but I am going to be the cynic here and say we are devolving as a species, generally speaking. And I do not have that faith in humanity.

[Linda Holmes]

This is.

[Glen Weldon]

I'm not used to this position. I'm not used to being in this position.

[Stephen Thompson]

Glenn Weldon, Voice of hope I tend.

[Linda Holmes]

To agree with Glenn. I choose to believe that people will value something human in art because I just think I cannot imagine a universe where that doesn't happen for the sake.

[Aisha Harris]

Of our jobs and all the people, all the work we love. I hope that is very true.

[Glen Weldon]

Next year's predictions episode is going to be entirely AI and they're gonna play this and they're gonna laugh. They're gonna do that. Ha ha ha.

[Linda Holmes]

Ha ha ha. We'd love to know what your pop culture predictions are for the new year. You can find us on [e-mail] PCHH and that brings us to the end of our show. Aisha Harris, Stephen Thompson, Glen Weldon, thanks so much for being here and predicting the future.

[Glen Weldon]

Thank you, buddy.

[Aisha Harris]

Thank you.

[Glen Weldon]

Ha ha ha ha ha. What's happening now?

[Linda Holmes]

This episode is produced by Hafsa Fathoma Lennon Sherburn and Liz Metzger, and edited by Jessica Reedy. Hello. Come in. Provides our theme music. Thank you for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from npr. I'm Linda Holmes, and we'll see you all tomorrow. I can definitely predict that.