Ex-Biglaw Associate Creates 'Couch Potato Salad,' A Hot New AI-Powered Puzzle Game
Couch Potato Salad's creator says that lawyers will love playing these word puzzles -- after all, it's what they're trained to do!
A kangaroo court date?
If you’ve been looking for a fun distraction to fill your time between billable hours, then have we got a great new game for you.
Say hello to Couch Potato Salad, a daily word puzzle game that’ll make you want to kick your Wordle habit to the curb. Created by Zack Gross — an NYU Law graduate who went on to become an O’Melveny associate before leaving law behind — the game prompts users to describe an AI-generated image using two common phrases linked together by a shared word. “Millions of people play puzzles daily on their phones,” Gross told Above the Law in an interview, “but they have never seen anything like this.”
Trust The Process: How To Build And Manage Workflows In Law Firms
Gross has been developing the game for about a year. He told ATL that he and a friend from NYU Law started playing a version of the game using only words with one-word clues, where one would have to guess “Crab Walk of Shame” or “Lunch Lady And The Tramp.” “I always thought it would work best as a visual game, because, as an example, ‘Monkey In The Middle School’ is amusing because you can imagine a monkey terrorizing a middle school,” he said. “I never had a way of generating the images I needed until DALL-E 3 was released late last year.”
Gross explained to ATL that it usually takes quite a bit of prompting and “a lot of trial and error” for DALL-E to create a workable puzzle, but now he’s able to use it to create a new puzzle each day of the week. Here’s what the “Monkey in the Middle School” example looks like:
(Courtesy image)
So, we wondered, are lawyers good at this game? “Yes, very!” Gross exclaimed. “The trick of this game is to be able to recognize that words change meaning in context, something that lawyers are trained to spot.” By way of example, Gross said that while his “Russian Dressing Room” puzzle could be a room full of Russian dressing, it’s “much more fun to use the combined phrase to change the meaning of the words.” Take a look:
Sponsored
Raising The Bar in Bar Prep
How Savvy Lawyers Build Their Law Firm Rate Sheet
Back To Basics: 6 Tech Tips Every Small Firm Needs To Hear
Back To Basics: 6 Tech Tips Every Small Firm Needs To Hear
(Courtesy image)
Gross told us that in the future, he’d love to monetize the game (perhaps by selling sponsorships and making brand-specific puzzles), but right now, he’s “focusing on building a user base.” At the moment, he’s working on creating a physical game for purchase so people can play this in person. He’s also got a children’s version of the game in mind that will be available for purchase. He told ATL that his 7-year old daughter loves playing the game. “She runs into my office with ideas, saying, ‘Daddy, I got one! Peanut Butter and Jelly Fish!!'”
Are you ready to dedicate your next .1 to having some fun? Click here to play today’s Couch Potato Salad puzzle.
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on X/Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.
Sponsored
Trust The Process: How To Build And Manage Workflows In Law Firms
