Real things everyday people got it to do, and how to try them yourself.
A random mix from the whole library. Shuffle for a new set.
A Business Insider Japan writer gave OpenAI Dots access to his email and calendar. When event and interview mail arrives, Dots pulls out the date and the job and puts it in his calendar. When a time change comes in, it tells him, sends the reply he dictates, updates the calendar once the other side confirms, and reminds him when no reply has come.
Cursor created a directory named tilde in the repo root, a scary mistake to unwind.
Type-B traveler Chelsea used her AI 'Sir Wiggles' (penguin avatar) to scan hundreds of saved Instagram posts, extract everything saved from Sardinia, and generate an itinerary — converting scattered saved content into a trip plan for the Sardinia leg of a month-long Italy trip.
Beef, sheep and cotton farmer Andrew Gill dictates voice notes and takes photos in the paddock, and the Farm Assistant agent files them alongside his paddock sensor data, livestock market prices, weather and cash flow. Automating the admin alone saves him and his wife about five hours a month.
He built an app that lets their nanny track her worked hours in it, so the family does not have to keep track so closely. The app holds their contract details with her, including the exceptions for vacation and sick days, and gives a total at the end of the week for payment reconciliation. It is one of several small apps he has built for family life.
He built a workflow that connects to their bank accounts and credit cards through Plaid and emails him and his wife a budget update three times a week, showing how they are tracking against the budget, with spending analysis and suggestions for cheaper alternatives.
A company owner asked the AI for a premium redesign of his website. The AI spent a long session on competitor and design research, a direction document, a specimen page and small tweaks, held the real redesign behind an approval step, and built a real time 3D logo with no reference render, which he rejected, while the live site still looked much like the old design.
A user set up an AI food team under his chief-of-staff bot: a Meal Organiser that knows the lunches and dinners he likes, a Shopper that fills his grocery cart, and a Cooking Bot that walks him through each meal. He says the shopping takes under 3 minutes versus about an hour at the shops or 30 minutes online, with meals cooked in under 20 minutes; he checks out himself.
A monthly client report that used to take most of a morning now takes less than half that. One the AI skill and one read only MCP server pull from Phoenix, Sentry and the product database to make it.
The AI vibe-coded a native mxswitch app running on both laptops that sends a DDC command to switch monitor inputs when keyboard and mouse switch devices.
Every idea is a real post from someone who tried it, summarized in our words, with a link to the original. App names are swapped for plain words.