Ask ChatGPT: "How can I get $1,000,000 in 7 days?" / Follow its step-by-step plan / Step 1: "Start with $2,000,000" / Step 1: "Start with $2,000,000"
A Gru's Plan post.
You tell everyone the group chat is dead and you're muting it for good. Eleven minutes later you've replied with a thumbs up, a gif and a full paragraph about something that doesn't concern you. Two weeks of announcing that this season is dull and the whole thing has run out of ideas. Same night: you're on the sofa at eight, snack ready, watching the new episode. Again. You swear off the game for good, delete the shortcut and tell your friends it's over. Friday arrives. Someone asks "one more?" and you are already logged in, apparently. You loudly retire from organising the group holiday. Three days later you've made the spreadsheet, chased the deposits and are explaining the colour coding to someone who hasn't read it. **Why it caught on:** the picture is Gru, the villain of the animated film Despicable Me (2010), presenting a plan on a flip chart to his minions. The blank charts made a perfect template: two panels of a confident plan, then two where Gru realises the flaw. It spread from 2018 because everyone has a plan with one obvious hole.