OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, is stepping into physical retail with an unusual mix of products this week, rolling out a branded rubber basketball priced at $70 alongside its first genuine piece of consumer hardware: a $230 mini keyboard built for users of its AI coding assistant, Codex.

The basketball is part of a broader merchandise push OpenAI is calling "Pause. Play. Prompt.," a campaign the company says is meant to remind people that creativity extends beyond screens. The product listing describes the ball as "a physical reminder that creativity doesn't just live on our screens." Alongside the basketball, OpenAI's new merchandise shop also includes a $175 quarter-zip sweatshirt emblazoned with the word "research" in cursive lettering, along with other items carrying inspirational slogans such as "Good research takes time."

The pricing has drawn some pointed commentary from tech reporters. TechCrunch's Amanda Silberling noted that the "Pause. Play. Prompt." branding does not appear to exist anywhere else on OpenAI's site, joking that the campaign seemed designed to discourage people from spending all day inside the company's own products. She also questioned who exactly the basketball was designed for, writing bluntly that she "could not pay me $70 to walk onto a community court" with the branded ball.

The more consequential hardware news, however, arrived a day earlier, when OpenAI unveiled the Codex Micro, officially named the kbd-1.0-codex-micro, marking the company's first true hardware product. Built in partnership with........

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