06-01-2026FAST COMPANY IMPACT COUNCIL

Max Headroom is the godfather of AI influencers

Max Headroom was designed to glitter and stutter but today’s AI influencers are no longer visibly artificial.

[Photo: Getty Images]

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In 1985, three British writers, George Stone, Annabel Jankel, and Rocky Morton created Max Headroom, a glitching, stuttering synthetic personality derived from a human template for the TV show Max Headroom: 20 Minutes into the Future. They imagined him as satire—a distorted reflection of the media culture shaped by Ronald Reagan and Margaret........

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