howtobedigital

Learn → Digital Play

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LESSON 02 · DIGITAL PLAY

8 MINUTES (PLANNED, NOT YET MEASURED) · LAST CHECKED 27 JULY 2026

Ask it something daft and see what happens

There is a first time with any tool and it is better that it is not the day something depends on it. This lesson has nothing at stake and no right answer. You cannot fail it. That is deliberate.

After this you will be able to

Use one of these tools once, with nothing of yours in it, so that the first time is not at work.

Skip this if you have already typed something into one of these tools and read what came back.

What you need

The play

The aim of the game

To find out what one of these tools is actually like, with nothing of yours in it and nothing riding on the answer.

Prepare to play

Play

  1. Ask it something with no correct answer. “What would a cat put in a job application?” “Explain a kettle to somebody from 1750.” “Write a weather forecast for the inside of a fridge.”
  2. Read what comes back. Notice the tone: confident, tidy, ready to go.
  3. Ask it to do the same thing again, differently. “Shorter.” “Make it sound like a football commentator.”
  4. Ask it something you know the answer to and it might not — something local, something small, something recent.
  5. Notice what it does when it does not know. That is the most useful thing on this page.

Play on

Steps

  1. Open a free AI chatbot in a browser. If it asks you to make an account and you would rather not, stop here. This lesson is not worth an account.

    You should see a box to type in, usually at the bottom of the page.

  2. Type something with no right answer. “What would a cat put in a job application?” will do. Press Enter.

    You should see your text appear above the box, then a reply start to write itself, a line at a time.

  3. Read it. Notice how confident it sounds. Confidence is a writing style here, not a measure of how right something is.

    You should have an answer that is tidy, sure of itself, and possibly quite funny.

  4. Type “shorter” and press Enter. Then type “now make it sound like a football commentator”.

    You should get the same idea back in a different shape. This is the single most useful thing to know about these tools: you can keep going, you do not have to get it right first time.

  5. Now ask it something small and local that you know the answer to. A street near you. A local shop. Something that happened last month.

    You should see one of two things. It says it does not know, or it makes something up that sounds right. Both are worth seeing once, and the second one is why nobody should send its work without reading it.

  6. Close the tab. Nothing has been kept about you, because you put nothing of yours in.

    You should be back where you started, having used one of these tools once.

If it goes wrong

It asks for an email address or a phone number before you can type anything.
Close it and try a different one, or stop. Nothing here is worth handing over an account for. This is play.
The answer is boring.
Ask for it again, worse. “Make it more dramatic.” “Make it rhyme.” Being able to ask again is most of the skill.
It said something about your local area that is wrong.
Good. That is the lesson. It will say wrong things in exactly the same confident voice as right things, and there is no signal in the writing that tells you which is which.

Do today

Ask one free AI chatbot one question that has no right answer, and read what comes back. Nothing of yours in it. Then close the tab.

Download the practice card (one page, A4, PDF). No email address. No account. Print it, copy it, hand it out.

If you want to go further

Optional. Nothing in this lesson depends on it.

Written by · Craig Stanley · drafted 27 July 2026 · not yet signed

When this lesson is published it will carry a name, a published date and a last-checked date. It does not carry one yet, and this page says exactly what that signature means.