Job I was rejected from used my take-home assignment for their business.

This seems to be getting more common. A lot of jobs seem to be posted just to solicit free work with no intention of hiring anyone. I’ve run across this and so have most others in my field.

If I ever get another one, I will come up with plausible bullshit I hope they use in production. As it will then bring production down. And that’ll be exactly what they deserve.