Club Benefits
I pride myself on keeping up with the tougher news stories that tend to surface during hangouts — especially when a friendly debate starts to heat up.
Most of the time, those “spirited” conversations live in nerdy territory — the best fighting games, the strongest anime characters, the greatest movie villains. I can happily argue those for hours. But every now and then, the discussion pivots to bigger-picture issues — politics, finance, tech policy, global news.
Be it political, financial, tech-based, domestic/world news, etc., there’s usually a talking point that gets brought up from those themes that causes me to hide in a corner and look up some quick bullet points about it on my phone so I can offer my quick two cents on the situation at hand.
I had a lightbulb moment the other day while tinkering around with ChatGPT: “I wonder how it’d respond if I asked it to expound on random topics if I told it to explain it to me like I’m 10 years old…” So I went ahead and did just that to see if ChatGPT would help me mentally put it all together.
Thankfully, that’s exactly what happened.
I used my prompt to gain a better understanding of three complex topics I wanted to learn more about
There are three topics that I always struggle to understand whenever they come across my timeline: the modern-day RAM shortage plaguing the video game industry, Paramount paying big money to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, and how AI data centers are harming the environment. Before I threw each topic at ChatGPT, I started my latest conversation with the chatbot with this simple prompt: “Explain this like I’m 10 years old.”
The main thing I appreciated most about ChatGPT’s approach to breaking down each topic with an introduction that set me on the right path toward deeper comprehension of them all. Here’s how all three subject explanations began on behalf of ChatGPT as it transformed into a super-intelligent parent:
- The modern-day RAM shortage plaguing the video game industry: Okay — imagine your brain is like a desk. When your desk is big, you can spread out your homework, your notebook, your calculator, and your snacks all at once. You can grab whatever you need instantly. But if your desk is tiny, you can only put a few things on it. If you need something else, you have to stop, clean up, and swap it in. That takes time and can get annoying. That’s basically what RAM is for video game consoles and computers
- Paramount paying big money to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery: Let’s say there are two giant toy companies. One is called Paramount Skydance, and the other one is called Discovery. Each one makes tons of cool stuff — movies, TV shows, streaming services, cartoons, news channels, even video games
- How AI data centers are harming the environment: Okay — imagine the internet is like a giant invisible city. Inside that city are huge buildings filled with computers. These buildings are called data centers. When you use AI — like asking questions, making pictures, or writing stories — your request goes to one of those buildings
What followed those initial information breakdowns were commonly asked questions about the key points of the main topic, an easy-to-comprehend clarification on the subject at hand and the most important points split across bullet points.
My prompt helped ChatGPT strip away all the complicated jargon surrounding each topic, utilize analogies and focus on the principles of each by starting with a summary of the points before going on to the next one.
I tried another version of the prompt to test ChatGPT further
Since I’m usually busy with my professional life and don’t have enough time to read every source needed to fully grasp a certain matter. So I applied this prompt to my three aforementioned topics to see how ChatGPT would approach its role as my teacher: “Explain this like I'm a busy professional who only has 60 seconds.”
ChatGPT imagined I was a briefcase-carrying businessman on his way to a meeting where the topic I just inquired about would be a central theme during that meeting. I was surprised by how differently my AI assistant responded to my inquiries when I asked it to speak to me as if I worked at a Fortune 500 company instead of going to school in the 4th grade.
For this prompt, ChatGPT broke down each topic into what’s happening, the problem at the center of it, why it matters, the business impact of it all, and a bottom-line statement that wraps it all up in a bow.
Here’s the bottom line from ChatGPT on the RAM shortage in the video games industry that made me feel a lot smarter for reading it: “Games are evolving faster than console memory budgets. Until new hardware refreshes arrive, developers are fighting a resource bottleneck that’s quietly shaping what modern games can (and can’t) do.”
The takeaway
Not only will I do my due diligence to read up on as many valid sources on an elaborate subject, but from now on, I’ll use the “explain this like I’m 10 years old” prompt and the “explain this like I’m a busy professional who only has 60 seconds” to get an even better grasp on them.
The first prompt leads to ChatGPT expounding on convoluted topics by using the sort of methods an elementary school teacher would adopt while talking to their class, while the second prompt makes it behave like a trustworthy assistant that stays on top of everything for their boss’s sake.
Use either one if you’d like on any and every topic imaginable to get a good lead on its biggest points or just get a much-needed refresher.
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