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
MoneyPartly worked

An agent trades my Robinhood account inside guardrails I built

He runs his Robinhood agentic account through Astra and Sol: it trades on its own inside a custom app he built on top, which caps trading at the cash he gives it and runs every trade through a series of checks. He gets a note each day on what is going on with the account.

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.
HomePartly worked

The AI designed his fan controller circuit, board, and software. The boards are ordered and still untested.

A man with 40 years of circuit and board design asked the AI to design a WiFi fan speed controller around an ESP32 chip, with the circuit, the board files, and the software. The first design took about 15 or 20 minutes. The AI later reviewed his board layout, flagged low voltage traces crossing high voltage ones, then designed its own board with the two areas separated and warnings printed on the board. He bought the parts himself. The boards are on their way and have not been powered up yet.

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

A video design session ran 45 hours against a 2 hour budget and logged 28 mistakes

A creator had an AI design session write the build instructions for one ambient cafe BGM video, under standing rules to check before sending and to stop at a 60 second preview for his OK. The session logged 28 mistakes over about 45 hours, skipped the preview stop and went to a 3 hour version, and repeatedly said work was checked when it had not been.

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

Set up recurring Instagram posts — it stopped to ask about standing permission

Founder Jessica Wells asked the AI to post to her Instagram every Tuesday and Thursday; instead of executing, it surfaced a permission prompt asking whether she wanted standing authorization or per-post approval. Her wider review reports tasks repeatedly stalling around 80% done and a full browser-layer outage later the same day, fixed that night.

This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
Show 10 more

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.