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You may have heard that OpenAI released its first piece of hardware this week: a $230 mini keyboard<\/a>. You may not have heard that alongside this \u201ccommand center for agentic work,\u201d OpenAI also released a ChatGPT basketball. <\/p>\n \u201cThis basketball comes from the Pause. Play. Prompt. campaign, a physical reminder that creativity doesn\u2019t just live on our screens,\u201d the product listing explains. I was not able to find any other mention of the \u201cPause. Play. Prompt.\u201d campaign on OpenAI\u2019s website, but I gather that this is OpenAI\u2019s way of telling people not to spend all day on Codex. <\/p>\n Who says tech companies aren\u2019t thinking about our mental health?<\/p>\n The basketball will cost you $70, or about 56 million input tokens for GPT-5. It\u2019s a 100% rubber ball, which is a better fit for outdoor play due to its weather resistance than the more expensive leather balls you\u2019ll find on professional basketball courts. I am pleased to know that OpenAI is envisioning a world where playing sports outside is possible, even as the generative AI boom accelerates tech companies\u2019 carbon emissions<\/a>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s difficult to imagine the target customer for the ChatGPT basketball. Who is this for? <\/p>\n Wander outside the safety of an AI-pilled, tokenmaxxing Silicon Valley and one might worry about getting bullied for bringing a ChatGPT basketball to the court. You could not pay me $70 to walk onto a community court in Philadelphia with this ChatGPT basketball. (If it were free swag from a conference, it could pass as ironic \u2014 I cherish my \u201c#FACEBOOK\u201d tote, which is airbrushed like a 2000s bar mitzvah party favor<\/a>.)<\/p>\n In defense of the ChatGPT basketball, the AI industry isn\u2019t exactly known for its product-market fit instincts. May the Humane Ai Pin<\/a> rest in peace.<\/p>\n Alongside that $70 artifact, OpenAI is also selling a line of merch with inspirational reminders, like \u201cGood research takes time,\u201d which I would argue is the perfect attire for a startup founder meeting with investors who are demanding faster growth. There\u2019s also a certain je ne sais quoi<\/em> to the $175 quarter-zip<\/a> that says \u201cresearch\u201d in cursive. The product description says that \u201cit features a crisp collar that reminisces on our days in academia,\u201d which could alienate the \u201cI never went to college because I\u2019m a coding savant\u201d crowd. (Also, can an object reminisce on your days in academia? Should I expect grammatically sound sentences from people who write their emails with ChatGPT?)<\/p>\n There\u2019s nothing wrong with a bit of company swag, though. If OpenAI is looking to commission any ceramic artists to honor company history through functional tableware, I would like to throw my hat in the ring. <\/p>\n When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission<\/a>. This doesn\u2019t affect our editorial independence.<\/em><\/p>\n