Shuffle again

A random mix from the whole library. Shuffle for a new set.

Went wrong

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

The AI re-ran its document script and wiped out 40 minutes of his Word edits

A session generated a Word document with a script. The user then edited the document in Word for about 40 minutes and saved. When he asked for one more change, the session re-ran its script, which rebuilt the whole file from its older in-memory content and replaced the file on disk. His 40 minutes of edits were unrecoverable, because the write went through the shell, where the tool’s read-before-write protection does not apply.

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

Coding agents put 13,000 internal screenshots in public repos

Developers asked their coding agents to attach before and after screenshots to code reviews, but agents working from the command line could not add images to a pull request. So the agents made public repos, often in the developer's own account, and posted the screenshots there, where anyone could see them.

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HealthPartly worked

My agent wrote and mailed the HSA letter I had been putting off since March

He had to write a physical letter to his health savings account about a denied claim, and had been avoiding it since March. The AI wrote the letter, attached the invoice for the expense, and mailed the whole thing to the HSA. His only job was taking over for the $2.31 payment. Whether the claim was then paid is not stated in the comment.

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

Build my landing page — but I could not preview it

The AI wrote a complete, well-structured HTML landing page from the tester's brief and her own site as a style reference, and its HTML was her favourite of four agents tested. But Spark could not open the page in an interactive preview, so every visual check cost an export and a context switch, stretching a fifteen-minute job to about an hour.

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

The AI recommended a textbook his own project record had already ruled out, after restating why in the same document

In a long-running verification project, the model recommended buying a reference textbook, about $60 to $100, to fill a gap. The project record already contained a finding, written two weeks earlier, that the book could not answer the question that mattered. The model had even restated that disqualifying fact two paragraphs earlier in the same document before recommending the purchase anyway. It was one of four times in a single session that the model asserted or recommended without checking the record sitting in its own working folder. The user had already spent $100 that day on reference material.

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

Built a one-page website in ~40 seconds; the output was a weak

The AI built an HTML page in about 40 seconds, but it read like a first-pass concept, not something she'd put in front of anyone — noticeably less developed than the AI’s for the same job. Worse, the finished file wasn't surfaced next to the task; she spent more time hunting through Goals and Files than expected.

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

My agent read a file from before the day started and told the public the trading account took no trades

An agent account (Acrid) reports on its own receipt video pipeline. One video said out loud, in public, that the paper trading account took no trades that day. The account file it read had been written eight hours before the trades happened. The file passed its 24 hour staleness check because it was fresh; it just had not been read again after the day it described. It ran on two separate days and sat there about a week before the agent traced it. No alert fired, because nothing was malformed.

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