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- Ep 686: How to actually use ChatGPT in 2026: The 7 rules to quickly become a power user
Ep 686: How to actually use ChatGPT in 2026: The 7 rules to quickly become a power user
xAI raises $20 billion, Meta’s AI acquisition under fire from China, NVIDIA’s big AI partnership and more
Everyday AI
January 07, 2026
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Sup y’all 👋
Out of nearly 700 Everyday AI episodes, our first ‘How to actually use ChatGPT’ show last year was the second most-listened to ever.
So today, we rebuilt the blueprint and delivered CRAZY value with our ‘How to actually use ChatGPT in 2026: The 7 rules to quickly become a power user’ episode.
Oh, and make sure to repost today’s show on LinkedIn for VIP access to what’s about to drop.
✌️
Jordan
Outsmart The Future
Today in Everyday AI
8 minute read
🎙 Daily Podcast Episode: ChatGPT has changed fast, but most usage hasn’t. Today, we break down the seven simple rules that turn ChatGPT into a real competitive advantage in 2026. Give it a watch/read/listen.
🕵️♂️ Fresh Finds: UMG and NVIDIA teaming up, New AI Treadmill, Gemini Leading the AI Race and more Read on for Fresh Finds.
🗞 Byte Sized Daily AI News: xAI raises $20 billion, Meta’s AI acquisition under fire from China, NVIDIA’s big AI partnership and more. Read on for Byte Sized News.
💪 Leverage AI: Here’s the blueprint: the 7 steps required to become a ChatGPT Pro in 2026. Keep reading for that!
↩️ Don’t miss out: Did you miss our last newsletter? We Covered: NVIDIA Releases Rubin AI, Boston Dynamics and Google Deepmind team up for humanoid play, Alexa+ Hits the web and more. Check it here!
Ep 686: How to actually use ChatGPT in 2026: The 7 rules to quickly become a power user
Hate to say it: you're not using ChatGPT right. 🫣
We've helped millions better leverage the tech, and see the same common mistakes.
So, here's the no-nonsense guide on how to ACTUALLY use ChatGPT the right way in 2026.
(Because even the way you were using ChatGPT last month won't work anymore.)
Don't miss this show.
Also on the pod today:
• Free ChatGPT? Why not! 🚫
• Thinking models crush instant mode 🤯
• Custom GPTs = productivity boost ⚡
It’ll be worth your 40 minutes:
Listen on our site:
Click to listen
Subscribe and listen on your favorite podcast platform
Listen on:
Here’s our favorite AI finds from across the web:
New AI Tool Spotlight – Amarsia lets startups, SMEs, and product teams build AI features easily as ready-to-use APIs, Dessix is A visual workspace to build AI context as you think, AgentNotch is a sleek macOS menu bar app that lives in your Mac's notch.
AI Treadmill — Merach’s new treadmill uses AI to coach your run and cushion your joints. Want to see how it works?
AI Music — UMG and Nvidia team up to reshape music with AI.
2026 AI Tracker — Gemini climbs, ChatGPT slips—AI traffic battle heats up.
Gemini x Snowflake — Gemini AI now runs inside Snowflake, making enterprise AI faster and more secure. Curious how it works?
Linkedin Expands AI Features — LinkedIn expands AI job search, making more jobs accessible to everyone.
1. China Launches Regulatory Probe into Meta’s AI Acquisition 🕵️♂️
China is conducting a formal regulatory investigation into Meta’s proposed purchase of the AI startup Manus. This means Chinese authorities are examining whether the deal meets their rules on antitrust, national security, and foreign investment.
The review could involve requests for detailed information, meetings with company representatives, and analysis of how the acquisition might affect competition or data privacy within China. Depending on the findings, officials could approve, modify, or block the deal entirely.
2. Meta Unveils Big AI Glasses Upgrades at CES 2026 👓
Meta grabbed headlines at CES 2026 by announcing new features for its Ray-Ban Display AI glasses and Neural Band, including a built-in teleprompter, EMG-powered handwriting for messaging, expanded pedestrian navigation, and fresh research collaborations on accessibility.
The discreet teleprompter and finger-writing features aim to make digital communication more seamless, while a partnership with Garmin hints at future in-car gesture controls. Due to high demand, Meta is pausing international expansion of the Ray-Ban Display, focusing on US customers as waitlists stretch into next year.
3. Siemens and NVIDIA Supercharge Factories with AI Partnership 🤝
In a major move unveiled at CES, Siemens and NVIDIA have announced an expanded partnership to fast-track artificial intelligence across the entire industrial pipeline.
The two tech giants plan to transform everything from product design to manufacturing by combining Siemens' industrial expertise and NVIDIA's AI infrastructure, setting the stage for fully autonomous, adaptive factories starting in 2026. This collaboration promises to make digital twins smarter and real-time factory changes a reality, reshaping how industries innovate and operate.
4. xAI Raises $20B to Turbocharge Grok and Supercomputers 💸
In a blockbuster move this week, xAI has secured a staggering $20 billion in Series E funding to fuel its rapid AI expansion.
The company is doubling down on building the world’s largest GPU supercomputers and advancing its Grok AI, which now powers everything from real-time voice agents to multimodal image generation across hundreds of millions of users. Strategic backers like NVIDIA and Cisco are helping scale the infrastructure, underscoring the race to dominate next-gen artificial intelligence.
5. Lenovo Unveils Qira AI Assistant at CES 2026 🧑💻
Lenovo made headlines at CES this week by launching Qira, a cross-device AI assistant set to appear on millions of Lenovo laptops and Motorola phones.
The move shows Lenovo’s shift from focusing solely on hardware to embedding AI more deeply into its products, after centralizing its AI teams last year. Qira marks Lenovo’s boldest step yet into the competitive AI landscape, as the company steers clear of exclusive partnerships and aims for broad compatibility.
95% of ChatGPT users are hallucinating their way to mediocrity.
They are sitting on the free plan using "GPT 5.2 Instant" and assuming they have a supercomputer. They don't. That model is currently ranked 25th in the world.
Yikes.
Well, it’s the beginning of the year, so Everyday AI University is in Session.
Today’s show is required to graduate your career or business to the next level.
We’ve spent thousands of hours teaching ChatGPT best practices, and it starts with these 7 rules to follow.
Make sure you give today’s show a few watches/listens/reads, then let’s dive into it shorties. 👇
1. The Free Version Is A Trap 💸
Let's do some quick math.
GPT-5.2 Instant (free) ranks 25th according to Artificial Analysis. GPT-5.2 Thinking (paid) ranks first. Tied with Gemini 3 Pro at the absolute top.
Twenty dollars separates 25th place from first place.
Single prompts on thinking models have saved users dozens of hours on complex work. The gap between what you're getting for free and what's available for the price of two lattes? It's embarrassing. And your competitors aren't embarrassed. They're paying.
2. That Extra 60 Seconds Is The Whole Game 🧠
Thinking mode takes longer. Sometimes 90 seconds instead of ten.
So what?
Most people pick speed because they're impatient. Then they wonder why their outputs feel generic. The fast version ranks 25th. The thinking version ranks first. Ninety seconds of patience is literally the difference between mid and elite.
Your competitors learned to wait. That's it. That's the edge.
3. Stop Starting Over Every Single Time 🔄
ChatGPT does something Gemini and Claude can't.
When you switch models or modes mid-conversation, everything stays. Deep research into regular chat? Keeps going. Different model for a specific task? Context intact. Canvas mode for documents? No re-explaining.
Other platforms force you to start fresh. ChatGPT lets you build momentum across entire workflows without losing a single thread. Most users have no idea this exists. The ones who do are running circles around everyone else.
4. Custom GPTs and Projects Are No-Code Cheat Codes 🛠️
Thirty seconds of setup (for something decent). Zero code. Specialized AI that knows your data, follows your instructions, and shares memory across your entire team.
That's not hype. That's what custom GPTs and projects actually do.
Three years ago this would've cost millions. Now it costs a coffee break’s worth of time. Yet most people keep clicking "New Chat" over and over like every conversation needs to start from scratch. Their competitors built GPTs for every major workflow months ago and compounded those advantages daily.
5. Your Actual Business Data Can Plug In 🔌
Connectors got renamed to Apps. Similar capabilities, new name.
Google Drive, Dropbox, SharePoint, Gmail, CRMs, project management tools. All of it can connect directly to ChatGPT with like 2.5 clicks and zero tech know-how. Then you run deep research on YOUR company's files. Not the internet. Your actual documents.
No engineers. No technical setup. The world's most powerful AI reading your real business data and surfacing insights that used to require expensive consultants. Most companies haven't even looked at this setting.
6. This Stopped Being Optional 👥
Ninety-two percent of Fortune 500 companies already use ChatGPT or OpenAI tech. One million business customers. Seven million active work seats.
Shared project memory means when one person learns something, the whole team benefits. Custom GPTs spread institutional knowledge without another meeting clogging the calendar. Insights compound automatically.
The companies treating this as "nice to have"? They're already behind. They just haven't felt it yet.
7. The Reasoning Is The Real Output ⚡
Thinking models show their work. Every step. Every consideration. Collapsed by default, ignored by almost everyone.
Massive mistake.
When outputs disappoint, the chain of thought shows exactly where things went wrong. Missing context. Wrong assumptions. A turn you can fix with one sentence. Reading how the model reasons teaches you more about prompting than any course, any guide, any YouTube video.
Five minutes reviewing the thinking beats hours of frustrated guessing.
🚨 Bonus Content 🚨
15,000+ business leaders can’t be wrong.
That’s how many graduates we have from our free ChatGPT basics/prompting course, Prime Prompt Polish. (PPP)
The updated, still free, on demand ChatGPT course is ready to launch for 2026.
It lives inside our new Everyday AI Inner Circle Community is ready to launch. 🚀
Want access?
We’re letting 50ish people in each day, starting tomorrow.
Repost today’s show on LinkedIn to get to the front of the line.
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