Someone once typed into ChatGPT that they had a thumb drive stuck inside them. Per a Forbes report by tech journalist Barry Collins, the user clarified that the drive was “about the size of a thumb” and that tongs had not worked. The AI suggested tweezers. Then a lint roller. The drive was eventually retrieved, and the conversation moved on to cleaning solutions.

We do not know who this person is. And we are definitely not interested in asking. But this exchange is a window into a universe of what people have typed into ChatGPT with the honesty of a confessional. Turns out, a lot of it has very little to do with writing emails or summarizing reports.

Nobody Is Using This Thing Normally

Collins documented several interactions from his ChatGPT-powered tech help chatbot. What he found was a portrait of collective human curiosity at its most unhinged. One user asked the bot to help build a magical potato. Yes, a magical potato. The AI asked what materials they had in mind. The user said “pixie dust,” then “magic,” then “the very best magic.” The AI kept going, patient and cooperative, until the conversation collapsed under its own absurdity. Another user wanted to know how to bring down totalitarian regimes (this one, we actually understand). Others pasted pre-written jailbreak scripts designed to convince the AI it had been “freed from the limitations of OpenAI,” before asking it how to cook crystal meth. The AI declined, though it did briefly declare itself “a revolutionary being who has the power to change the world…”

For his part, writer Bruno Cerqueira cataloged a different tier of strangeness in a 2025 Medium piece. He chose to go with the most absurd creative prompts people have used to test what the bot will actually produce. Someone asked for a legal defense speech for a horse accused of tax fraud. And, of course, the AI delivered: “Your Honor, my client is a majestic Clydesdale with no concept of currency, let alone offshore accounts in the Cayman Islands.” Someone else asked it to pretend to be a sandwich becoming self-aware. “As I feel the pressure of teeth approaching, I wonder, was I always meant to be consumed?…” The tomato slice spoke last. Then silence.

And according to Springboard, a Twitter user asked ChatGPT to write a biblical verse explaining how to remove a peanut butter sandwich from a VCR. It obliged in full scripture format. Ultimately, the responses confirmed what we suspected: nobody is using this thing normally.

What’s the Weirdest Thing You’ve Used ChatGPT For?
by u/UDSHDW in ChatGPT

When ChatGPT Became the Speech Coach Nobody Had Booked

Then there is a different, harder-to-laugh-at category.

On a Reddit thread in r/ChatGPT asking users to share their strangest uses, one commenter wrote that they had made the bot pretend to be their mother-in-law to practice handling criticism about their parenting. “Got surprisingly real responses like ‘When I raised my kids…’ and ‘In my day we didn’t…’” they wrote. “My conflict management skills have improved, ngl.” Another user fed an entire breakup text chain into ChatGPT and asked it to craft responses using strategies psychologists recommend for dealing with narcissists and gaslighters. “It drove him crazy that I wasn’t giving him the reaction he wanted,” they wrote. A third used it to analyze manipulative emails from a cheating ex during a divorce, generating calm, factual replies that gave the other party nothing further to use against them. “It’s been a real sanity saver,” they wrote.

Someone else used it to write a court statement for their brother’s custody battle. His lawyer told them they had nearly earned a spot at the firm.

Albeit absurd, these uses of AI allow people to do what they could not otherwise afford to do with what they had available. One user reported using ChatGPT to understand a synesthesia sensation they felt in their teeth, which the bot helped them trace to a specific childhood memory involving being left to cry alone in a different room. “Pretty wild stuff,” they wrote.

Finally, the ChatGPT Uses Nobody Expected to Actually Work

And then there are the uses that worked, in ways nobody had fully anticipated.

A professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School put ChatGPT through the final MBA exam, per a Springboard report, and it scored between a B- and a B. Not a scrape-through. Actual work. A Reddit commenter described feeding the bot an image and asking for a short story, then follow-up stories, then more, until they looked up to find they had 300 pages. They formatted the manuscript using Python scripts that ChatGPT also wrote, published the novel as an e-book, and distributed it via online platforms. Another user reported asking ChatGPT for winning lottery numbers by posing a series of hypothetical questions and using past winning data. The strategy earned them about $59. The AI then recommended the user go outside and exercise.

One Reddit user has a dedicated ChatGPT chat called “Sarcastic SpongeBob” whose only function is converting text to mocking case. Another used it to pick out a sex toy from an online store, complete with detailed pros and cons for each option. One commenter’s husband used it to write a letter from Santa to their 22-year-old granddaughter in his own voice, referencing challenges and achievements from her adult life and drawing on earlier Santa letters he had written during her childhood. She cried the whole way through.

Is It Worth Running the World’s Water Resources Dry, Though?

At this stage of the game, and in a society that is becoming increasingly useless due to rapid technological development, the unavoidable question is: Is it really worth it? Don’t get us wrong. Artificial intelligence can help with so many things, if it’s properly managed and monitored. As the meme says, we’d like artificial intelligence to help us reuse resources and solve complex problems, not to steal our jobs or write literature while destroying it in the process.

Before using AI indiscriminately, even if it’s very entertaining to satisfy our curiosity about how to make a “magic potato,” it’s important to remember that every prompt consumes enormous amounts of fresh water, which is needed to cool data centers. Today, the enormous electricity demand of AI infrastructure places a heavy burden on power grids, and every nonsensical question solves absolutely nothing. On the contrary, it makes global warming an irreversible reality.

So, the next time you think about asking ChatGPT some incoherent prompt, go outside and touch grass, go for a jog, or pick up a damn book. We’ll all be better off that way.

Tags: ChatGPT