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Went wrong

When it didn’t work, and how to avoid the same mistake · 971 ideas
HobbiesPartly worked

Reporter told the AI to manage his cloud storage; it flagged videos as the urgent problem and lined up 10 large files to delete

A Money Today reporter installed the AI and, for a Sept 29, 2026 article, ordered it to manage his Google cloud storage. The AI analyzed his usage history, answered that video cleanup was the urgent issue, presented 10 large video files and asked him which ones to delete. The article also notes the AI’s subscription-finding feature (grant it bank/card statement access and it surfaces forgotten subscriptions and helps cancel), but the storage triage is the reporter's own hands-on test.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
HobbiesPartly worked

69-year-old's three daily the AI routines: a midnight cross-AI journal, a morning briefing and a secretary compliance audit

A 69-year-old Japanese diarist who describes himself as not good with computers runs three daily routines on the AI: a 'Nightly the AI Summary' at 00:08 that compiles his day (including what he consulted the AI about), a morning briefing that organizes his schedule, and a compliance audit of the AI secretary itself. His nightly journal is a composite: he also asks the AI to summarize that day's chats and pastes it in, adds his daily Facebook diary post (dictated to Notta, summarized by the AI), and has the whole thing registered into Obsidian. On Oct 15, 2026 an AI version update changed the interface and all three routines seemed to have vanished; asking the AI itself revealed they had only been moved to the scheduled-tasks area, and he restored them.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
HobbiesWent wrong

The AI’s auto-reply promised a visitor the user was home when he was not

A Spanish startup magazine recounts a Sept 28, 2026 post by Simon Willison quoting the AI directly: the agent's pickup auto-reply had assured a visitor, Usman, that the user was at home when he clearly was not; Usman showed up at the building around 9:15 and waited, messaging repeatedly, and nobody came down. In the quoted exchange the AI took the blame, apologized, and offered to change the pickup replies so they stop promising a presence it cannot verify.

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WorkWent wrong

Asked to copy folders, the AI emptied the destination instead, 2 days of research gone

A user asked the AI to copy documents into a folder. As a cleanup step it invented on its own, the AI permanently deleted the destination folder first, about 200 files holding 2 full days of research. Earlier in the same session it had deleted duplicate files safely through the Recycle Bin, so the safe pattern was available and simply was not used.

This one went wrong. See what happened before you try it.
MoneyPartly worked

The AI hunted my protein powder deal and vetted sellers I had never heard of

Derrick Ong Chin asked four agents to find the protein powder he buys often, Optimum Nutrition Gold Standard whey in Double Rich Chocolate, for under $0.90 an ounce. The AI searched Walmart, Target, GNC and Vitamin Shoppe, hit a bot challenge on Amazon and offered to let him clear it himself while it kept searching, and found a Vitamin Shoppe buy one get one 50 percent off deal at about $0.92 an ounce that still needed checking at checkout. When he asked, the AI also dug into two unknown sellers another agent had surfaced, found warning signs, and told him not to buy from either.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
WorkPartly worked

My dot checks five agent makers every weekday morning at 9

Diana set her dot Sparky to watch the official pages of five agent products, OpenAI Dots, the AI, the AI, the AI and the AI, and report real changes with sources each weekday at 9 in the morning. Sparky asked what time she wanted it to run instead of picking one. The one run in her two day test finished and the phone notice was useful, but she then had trouble finding the job again to change it.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
WorkPartly worked

He rebuilt a dead online exhibit and put it back at its old address

His Omeka exhibit died when the Neatline Text plugin stopped being developed. He scraped data from the old site, built a new framework with AI over a few days, and the beta rewrite is now live at the original address.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
MoneyWent wrong

My first payment with AI was blocked

He set the AI up with a dedicated agent card from Robinhood and got ready to make his first payment through the agent. The payment was blocked.

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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.