If 2025 had a soundtrack, it would probably be the endless hum of notifications, algorithmic chaos, and the occasional cringe of yet another AI-generated video blowing up on your feed. And Merriam‑Webster knows it: their Word of the Year, is slop — a term that captures more than messy mud or leftover porridge. In its 21st-century incarnation, slop is digital content churned out in bulk, low-quality, and AI-powered — the kind that dominates feeds while our attention spans shrivel in real time.

This isn’t just about bad videos or lazy memes. It’s about saturation. About the creeping sense that the internet is no longer shaped by human curiosity or creativity, but by volume. And lately, I’ve noticed something telling in my own habits. I’ve become so used to scrolling past videos that feel oddly unhinged — visually dense, emotionally flat, narratively nonsensical — that I now instinctively head straight to the comments. There’s a strange moment of relief when someone confirms what I already suspect: it’s AI. The content isn’t meant to make sense because it wasn’t made by a human mind at all. It’s beyond comprehension because it’s beyond intention.
 

That reaction alone says a lot about where we are. The rise of slop reflects a deeper anxiety about what we’re consuming and who — or what — is shaping it. AI has lowered the barrier to creation so dramatically that the internet is filling faster than we can process. Quantity has overtaken quality. Novelty has replaced meaning. And the result is a kind of digital white noise, where genuinely thoughtful, human‑made work struggles to cut through.