The Latest AI Trend Is Giving Everyone an 80s Makeover!

Photo Credit: Jorge Fakhouri Filho | Pexels

Forget flying cars and robot overlords, AI’s latest contribution to society is showing us what we might have looked like in the 80s… and the results are gnarly!

South Africa (10 September 2026) – “It was acceptable in the 80s”… or was it?

AI can be used for many things. To research, to learn more about ideas that matter to us, to brainstorm, plan or even reply to emails. We see you. We don’t mind. If it’s helping you be a little more productive, then YAY for you.

I MC’d a conference recently and a futurist took to the stage to speak about AI… where we are now and where we are going. He asked the audience to raise their hands if they currently use AI in some way and every single person put their paws up. Every person in the room. It’s here and it’s being integrated into almost everything we do.

Yes, there is a much larger discussion around whether this is a good or bad thing, what it means for our jobs and creativity, how it impacts the world and how our relationship with technology is changing. In a recent conversation with Dion Chang, another futurist, we unpacked exactly that and spoke about how seemingly unrelated shifts in technology and culture can actually tell us an enormous amount about where society is going.

But AI also has trends. Fun trends. Completely ridiculous trends that serve absolutely no purpose other than making us smile. And I am very much okay with those too. We’ve seen the Caricature trend, the Met Gala trend and the Action Figure trend, where suddenly everyone on our feeds was packaged into a little plastic box with all the things that apparently made them, well, them.

And now we’re going back to the 80s.

Over the last two days, my social feeds have been filled with people sharing AI-generated photos of themselves from four decades ago. Big hair, bigger glasses, denim, neon, leather jackets, moustaches and enough hairspray to do some proper damage to the ozone layer. Obviously, I needed to know what 80s Brent looked like too. So I tested it. And it made me giggle. I wanted to share that laughter with you, so I am giving you the prompt. And it’s easy. All you have to do is upload a photo and ask your AI, “What would I have looked like in the 80s?” and voilà… it will take you right back. You can add more details if you want to make it more accurate, like telling it what your real hair looks like but that’s pretty much it.

Is this what artificial intelligence was invented for? I don’t think so. Is it solving any of the world’s biggest problems? Also no. But not everything we do needs to be serious or productive or somehow change the world. Sometimes, we can just create a silly little picture that makes us smile. And I believe, perhaps… smiling at photos was totally acceptable in the 80s.