A desk lamp lit on a desk with a tablet, a keyboard and a mouse, at a window over a mountain valley with beargrass on the slope

Which AI tool should I use?

The one you'll keep talking to. Pick a model you're comfortable with, in an app you can reach every day. The skill carries over.

Start See the picture

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The picture

Models are roommates. Apps are houses.

The drawing is a grid. Down the side are three kinds of model: quick and light, steady and everyday, and deep and careful. Across the top are three kinds of app: a conversation, a helper for tasks with your files, and a tool for building. The steady model is followed across all three apps, doing different work in each. Then one current question goes to three models: one looks it up, one says it doesn't know, and one guesses.

A picture, not a ranking.

1 of 4Models are roommates.Quick and light, steady and everyday, deep and careful. Different temperaments.
2 of 4Apps are houses.A conversation, a helper for tasks with your files, a tool for building.
3 of 4Same roommate, different house.Different house, different results. Pick the pair that fits the job.
4 of 4For current facts, pick one that looks it up.One question, three models. Check anything a small model tells you.

Chat Files Build Quickand light Steadyeveryday talk it throughsort, draft, tidyeveryday fixes Deepand careful

One question, three models

“Who runs the hardware store in town now?”

Model onelooked it up
Model twosaid it didn't know
Model threeguessed a name

Same person, different house, different results.

The answer

Start with selection, not mastery. Find a model you're comfortable talking to, in an app you can reach every day, and use it on one real task this week. The big AI tools copy each other, so what you learn in one carries over.

Key points

Models are roommates: quick and light, steady and everyday, deep and careful.
Apps are houses: a conversation, a helper for tasks with your files, a tool for building.
Same roommate, different house, different results.
For current facts, use one that looks things up. Check what a small model tells you.
When in doubt, leave it out.

Selection, not mastery

Most people start by asking which AI tool is best. A better first question: which one will you keep talking to? Find a model you can get comfortable with, and a place where it is there when you need it. Mastery comes later, with use.

Models are roommates. Apps are houses.

Every big AI company makes a few models, from quick to careful. Think of them as roommates with different temperaments.

Quick and light. Fast drafts, rewrites and simple lookups. Lighter models cost less to run, so use them for simple jobs.
Steady, everyday. Most writing and summaries. A good default.
Deep and careful. Hard writing, long documents and careful reasoning.

Then there is the house you meet them in: the app. A chat window is for talking it through. A desktop helper can take a task along with your files. A tool for building makes things, like the site you build with the DIY kit in Claude Code.

Same roommate, different house, different results.

Claude's own names for its three are Haiku, Sonnet and Opus. ChatGPT and Gemini offer the same range under their own names, and the names change often.

The houses copy each other

The big AI companies now mirror each other's features. Get comfortable with one, and a lot of that comfort carries over to ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude. The app is just a house. The skill transfers.

Here are the options

Not a pitch. Just the shelf.

ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. Comparable everyday choices. Pick the one you like talking to.
Perplexity. Research with sources you can click.
Claude Code and Cursor. For building. The DIY kit is built with Claude Code.

Which of these sounds like your job?

For current facts, use one that looks it up

Ask three models the same question about something current, like who runs a shop in your town now. One looks it up. One admits it doesn't know. One guesses, and sounds just as sure as the other two.

Use a model that looks things up for current facts, and check anything a small model tells you.

The data rule: when in doubt, leave it out

Go ahead

Drafting emails and notes.
Summarizing public documents.
Brainstorming and planning.

Never paste

Customer records.
Health information.
Card numbers, account numbers or passwords.
Anything private about a person.

Always

Review every output.
Keep a person in charge of decisions.
Say when AI helped.

Some tools block card numbers and passwords on their own. None of them can tell which of your notes are private. That part is yours.

Your one thing this week

Pick one real task from your week, with nothing private in it.
Write the request in four parts: who you are, the job, what it needs to know, and what you want back.
Run it on two models. Pick the one you'd talk to, and write down why in one line.

This week I will use ______ for ______.

From Mark Ulett's AI workshops and talks. BeargrassAI, Columbia Falls, Montana.

Build your own site with Claude Code.

The DIY kit walks you and Claude Code through building your site, step by step. It comes with six months of hosting and the editor, the tools we build with, a domain, and Scout and the Directory.

$899 for six months, then $149 a month.

See what comes with DIY

Talk to your AI about this

Copy this and paste it into ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini or whatever you use. It brings this page with it, and tells your AI where to read the rest.

I'm looking at BeargrassAI (https://beargrassai.com/). BeargrassAI helps owner-led rural small businesses get found and described truthfully, by people and by AI. One person, Mark Ulett, in Columbia Falls, Montana. Help me decide whether it fits my business.

Read before you answer. Open each link yourself; do not guess what it says, and tell me if one will not open.

1. https://beargrassai.com/diy/resources/pick-a-tool/: the page I was reading: Which AI tool should I use?.
2. https://beargrassai.com/llms.txt: who BeargrassAI is, when it fits, every price and the facts.
3. https://beargrassai.com/llms-full.txt: every page in full, if you can read a long file.
4. https://beargrassai.com/pricing/: what each thing costs and what it includes.
5. https://validated.directory/b/beargrassai: BeargrassAI's own record in its directory, the kind of record a business gets.
6. https://beargrassai.com/directory/: the Directory, step one.
7. https://beargrassai.com/scout/: Scout, step two.
8. https://beargrassai.com/diy/: DIY, step three: the kit, hosting and the tools.
9. https://beargrassai.com/custom/: custom work, bookings and payments.
10. https://beargrassai.com/about/: who builds it and answers the phone.

How to weigh it:
- Check each claim against the page it comes from, and name the page.
- Work out what it would cost me in a year from the pricing page, not from memory.
- Look at BeargrassAI's own directory record as an example of what my business would get.
- Say plainly if it does not fit, or if something simpler or free would do.

First, ask me three or four questions about my business: what I do, the towns I serve, who my customers are, and what they ask before they call. Wait for my answers. Do not guess.

Then tell me, in plain words:

One. Whether BeargrassAI fits my business, and which of its offers, if any.
Two. What it would cost me in the first year.
Three. What I would have afterwards that I do not have now.
Four. Anything you could not check, and how I could check it.

Nothing is sent anywhere. It goes to your clipboard.

Which AI tool should I use?

Models are roommates. Apps are houses.

The answer

Key points

Selection, not mastery

Models are roommates. Apps are houses.

The houses copy each other

Here are the options

For current facts, use one that looks it up

The data rule: when in doubt, leave it out

Your one thing this week

Read next

Build your own site with Claude Code.

Start with the Directory. Go further when you are ready.