https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/18/opinion_piece_ai_tools/ # # Sign in / up The Register(r) -- Biting the hand that feeds IT # # # Topics Security Security All SecurityCyber-crimePatchesResearchCSO (X) Off-Prem Off-Prem All Off-PremEdge + IoTChannelPaaS + IaaSSaaS (X) On-Prem On-Prem All On-PremSystemsStorageNetworksHPCPersonal TechCxOPublic Sector (X) Software Software All SoftwareAI + MLApplicationsDatabasesDevOpsOSesVirtualization (X) Offbeat Offbeat All OffbeatDebatesColumnistsScienceGeek's GuideBOFHLegalBootnotesSite NewsAbout Us (X) Special Features Special Features All Special Features Cybersecurity Month VMware Explore Blackhat and DEF CON Cloud Infrastructure Month Malware Month The Reg in Space Spotlight on RSA Vendor Voice Vendor Voice Vendor Voice All Vendor Voice HERE and AWS Vonage Amdocs GE Vernova with AWS GE Vernova with AWS Siemens and AWS Gen AI Siemens and AWS IT/OT Amazon Web Services (AWS) New Horizon in Cloud Computing DDN Google Cloud Data Transformation Google Gemini Hewlett Packard Enterprise: Edge-to-Cloud Platform Intel vPro VMware (X) Resources Resources Whitepapers Webinars & Events Newsletters [aiml] AI + ML 43 comment bubble on white Microsoft starts boiling the Copilot frog: It's not a soup you want to drink at any price 43 comment bubble on white You think employee-generated content is bad now? icon Rupert Goodwins Mon 18 Nov 2024 // 10:34 UTC # Opinion In 1968's Star Trek episode, "The Ultimate Computer," Captain Kirk had his ship used to test M5, a new computer. A copilot, if you will, for the Starship Enterprise. Designed to more efficiently perform the jobs of the human crew, the M5 indeed did those jobs very well yet with such a terrifying lack of understanding it had to be disabled. But not before exacting a terrible price. Last week, Microsoft 365 Copilot, a copilot, if you will, for the technology enterprise sold as performing human tasks with more efficiency, increased its prices by 5 percent, the first of many finely judged increments in the old style. Unlike the M5, it isn't in the business of physical destruction of the enemy, instead producing commercial victory with the photon torpedo of productivity and the phaser bolts of revitalized workflow. [aiml] Satya Nadella, Microsoft's own Captain Kirk, said at the end of October that AI was due to deliver $10 billion revenue in the next quarter. It must be working, but in the absence of any clearly proven competitive results, it is time to look at Microsoft 365 Copilot itself 20 months after its introduction. Do the scanners show the utopian outcomes beloved of both Trek and Redmond franchises? [aiml] [aiml] Some time back, this columnist noted the stark disparity between the hype of the metaverse in business and the stark, soulless hyper-corporate experience. Line-of-business virtual reality has two saving graces over corporate AI. It can't just appear on the desktop overnight and poke its fingers into everything involved in the daily IT experience. Thus it can't generate millions in licensing at the tick of a box. VR is losing its backers huge amounts of money that can't be disguised or avoided, but corporate AI is far more insidious. As is the dystopia it is creating. Look at the key features by which Microsoft 365 Copilot is being sold. [aiml] Pop up its sidebar in Loop or Teams, and it can auto-summarize what has been said. It can suggest questions, auto-populate meeting agendas. Or you can give it key points in a prompt and it will auto-generate documents, presentations, and other content. It can create clip art to spruce up those documents, PowerPoints, and content. How is this sold? That it will make you look more intelligent by asking Copilot to suggest a really good question while doing an online presentation or a Teams meeting. What's also implied but unsaid: If you're the human at the end of this AI-smart question and want to look smart enough to answer it, who are you gonna call? Copilot. The drive is always to abdicate the dull business of gathering data and thinking about it, and communicating the results. All can be fed as prompts to the machine, and the results presented as your own. [aiml] And so begins a science-fiction horror show of a feedback loop. Recipients of AI-generated key points will ask the AI to expand them into a document, which will itself be AI key-pointed and fed back into the human-cyborg machine a team has become. Auto-scheduled meetings will be auto-assigned, and will multiply like brainworms in the cerebellum. The number of reports, meetings, presentations, and emails will grow inexorably as they become less and less human. Is the machine working for us, or we for the machine? * Win 11 refreshes delayed, say PC makers - and here's why * Microsoft 365 Copilot goes monthly for a 5% premium and annual commitment * Productivity suites, Exchange servers in path of Microsoft's end-of-support wave * Big Tech is building the metaverse of its own dreams. You don't want to go there Generative AI output feeding back into itself can go only one way, but Copilot in the enterprise is seemingly designed to amplify that very process. And you have to use it if you want to keep up with the perceived smartness and improved productivity of your fellow workers, and the AI-educated expectations of the corporate structure. Even the seemingly innocuous business of Copiloting the Dall-E-powered Designer graphics tool into documents is vile poison. The pictures generated can have no insights beyond what the generative prompts contain, diluted by whatever fantasies exist in the heart of the machine. But those pictures in a report or a presentation trigger expectations of extra meaning, of explication. The reason clip art feels so empty, so tiring, is that it speaks up our cognition and delivers nothing. That's human-designed clip art, taking some effort to find and include; the machine version is there instantly. It will push those micro-comas of PowerPoint viewing into new realms of unconscious revolt. Human cognition is not the limiting factor of workflow. Under-stimulated boredom, tedium-induced laziness, performing actions that add nothing, and fear of failure-powered mediocrity are the enemies. All these find very comfortable new berths in corporate AI. It is taboo to say how far your heart sinks when you have to create or consume the daily diet offered up in company email, Teams, meeting agendas, and regular reports. You won't be able to say how much further it will sink when all the noise is amplified and the signal suppressed by corporate AI. Fair warning: Buy the bathysphere now. There is an escape hatch. Refuse. Encourage refusal. When you see it going wrong, say so. A sunken heart is no platform for anything good personally, as a team, or as an organization. Listen to your humanity and use it. Oh, and seek out "The Ultimate Computer" - it's cliched, kitsch, and cuts to the bone. The perfect antidote for vendor AI hype. (r) Get our Tech Resources # Share More about * Copilot More like these x More about * Copilot Narrower topics * Copilot+ PC Broader topics * OpenAI More about # Share 43 comment bubble on white COMMENTS More about * Copilot More like these x More about * Copilot Narrower topics * Copilot+ PC Broader topics * OpenAI TIP US OFF Send us news --------------------------------------------------------------------- Other stories you might like Is Microsoft's AI Copilot? CoPilot? Co-pilot? MVP creates site to help get it right When you say 'team' do you mean 'Teams' or a SharePoint 'team site'? Letmecorrectthatforyou.com explains the difference Software28 Oct 2024 | 42 Microsoft 365 Copilot goes monthly for a 5% premium and annual commitment Other subscriptions also set for updates in the name of 'cash flow flexibility' Software14 Nov 2024 | 23 Microsoft rolls out AI-enabled Notepad to Windows Insiders Rewrite 'please leave my text editor alone' OSes7 Nov 2024 | 61 Why AI builds best on private clouds AI projects under pressure to show real value in the tightest of timeframes might be worth keeping on-premises Sponsored Feature [aiml] Microsoft has reached $1M giveaway levels of desperation to attract users to Bing Stuffing it full of AI hasn't helped, so let's try financial incentives Software4 Nov 2024 | 72 Microsoft turning away AI training workloads - inferencing makes better money Azure's acceleration continues, but so do costs AI + ML31 Oct 2024 | 18 Microsoft says its Copilot AI agents set to tackle employee tasks in November Let bots manage your supply chain? What could possibly go wrong? AI + ML21 Oct 2024 | 17 Copilot's crudeness has left Microsoft chasing Google, again Opinion Surely Redmond knows that almost nobody has tamed unstructured data? AI + ML9 Oct 2024 | 27 Microsoft hits go on Windows 11 24H2: Fresh features, bugs, and a whole lotta AI Complete with Copilot Vision - but sessions won't be stored, insists Redmond OSes2 Oct 2024 | 52 Microsoft's Copilot 'Wave 2' is a tsunami of unanswered questions updated What the next few months hold for the productivity chatbot AI + ML16 Sep 2024 | 37 Copilot for Microsoft 365 might boost productivity if you survive the compliance minefield Loads of governance issues to worry about, and the chance it might spout utter garbage AI + ML4 Sep 2024 | 25 Microsoft exec warns of business functions being sacrificed on the altar of AI Too many IT modernization projects? Not enough budget? 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