The Backlash Machine: How AI Lost the Room, 2022–2026

A timeline of the gathering public revolt against generative AI, from ChatGPT's launch in November 2022 through the artists' protests, the 2023 Hollywood writers' and actors' strikes, the copyright lawsuits, the European AI Act's passage, and the campus booing of tech executives in the mid-2020s. The throughline is the widening gap between how fast the industry shipped and how slowly the public, courts, unions and regulators granted consent — and the moment executives like Adam Mosseri began openly conceding that the resentment is durable rather than a phase. This timeline was generated automatically by TimeStrands AI from Wikipedia research. Facts are sourced; framing may be imperfect.