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Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

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Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#51

Post by heavyset_go »

PeterHolzwarth wrote: post #27
chris_wot wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That little copilot icon will sit there unused and unloved by people who will, much like with online ads, screen it out whilst they do what they actually want to do.

For some, but what about the others? The reddit mentality of "everyone hates LLM AI tools" is just a very loud segment. What about everyone else? What about a random Joe who asks it questions to find some path through figuring out why their computer is acting all wonky? What about the people who don't know the first thing about dealing with their water heater suddenly going south, and ask it some basic questions of h…

> What about the people who don't know the first thing about dealing with their water heater suddenly going south, and ask it some basic questions of how to approach that problem?

Why would you trust an LLM's advice about an appliance that can hideously disfigure you when they regularly fuck up basic advice about computers?

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#52

Post by BenFranklin100 »

The most pathetic aspect of Microsoft’s Copilot rollout is not Copilot’s poor performance & integration with SharePoint, but that Microsoft actually renamed Microsoft Office to Microsoft 365 Copilot on Windows.

You’re a company whose main product has a brand recognition that ranks right up there with Coca-Cola and Apple, and you rename it after a new product that is a pile of hot garbage. Absolutely mind-boggling.

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#53

Post by PeterHolzwarth »

flykespice wrote: post #46
PeterHolzwarth wrote: post #18

I perceive MS as just being in the "get people using it, accustomed to it, used to it, habituated to using it throughout their day" phase for the default free Win10/11 tier. That little copilot icon is sitting there in the task tray, clickable and usable. I think people will, to whatever degree makes sense for them, get used to making some use of the basic free tier. Monetization / restrictions requiring some degree…

> That little copilot icon is sitting there in the task tray, clickable and usable. I'm using Win 11 and I didn't even notice Copilot on my task bar until you mentioned it... I think that is a wakeup call for me to finally flash my pc to linux

I get what you - a HN user - mean. But for the broader planet of Windows users, it just becomes this thing you click to get some general info from on whatever general topic, question, or need comes to mind. I think it is rapidly becoming quit banal - a thing people think of as just being another part of using their computing device. No fanfare; no fireworks; no hand-wringing over rights or privacy or training data: just a thing you click on to ask questions to as part of their normal day.

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#54

Post by PeterHolzwarth »

blibble wrote: post #44
PeterHolzwarth wrote: post #18

I perceive MS as just being in the "get people using it, accustomed to it, used to it, habituated to using it throughout their day" phase for the default free Win10/11 tier. That little copilot icon is sitting there in the task tray, clickable and usable. I think people will, to whatever degree makes sense for them, get used to making some use of the basic free tier. Monetization / restrictions requiring some degree…

if the generic public start associating all AI with the useless "Copilot" then Microsoft will succeed in killing off the entire AI industry

I think you'd be surprised at the number of average users who don't think of it as useless. As I've mentioned on comments elsewhere in this thread, remember what we here were talking about a couple years ago: LLM's killing websearch.

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#55

Post by discordance »

PeterHolzwarth wrote: post #18

I perceive MS as just being in the "get people using it, accustomed to it, used to it, habituated to using it throughout their day" phase for the default free Win10/11 tier. That little copilot icon is sitting there in the task tray, clickable and usable. I think people will, to whatever degree makes sense for them, get used to making some use of the basic free tier. Monetization / restrictions requiring some degree…

If that's the case, it's a very complacent strategy compared to ChatGPT, which people yearn for and automatically turn to.

It also disregards a big chunk of people not using Windows, where the little Copilot icon is not built in.

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#59

Post by iJohnDoe »

It’s an annual commitment by default. Admins might enable it if it was monthly. However, you can’t risk one license locking you into an M365 contract. Most admins can’t and shouldn’t make that decision. Failure on Microsoft’s part for the annual requirement. Otherwise, most would toggle the license on and give it a try.

Re: Microsoft 365 Copilot's commercial failure

#60

Post by mrandish »

1.8% is terrible adoption, especially in light of MSFT hijacking the right-CTRL key of every Windows licensed PC to rename it "CoPilot" key. I'm thrilled that Copilot is sucking wind because their over-aggressive pushiness about CoPilot in Windows and Office has been annoying and wasted my time having to figure out how to disable it but the REAL reason I despise CoPilot is that while stealing a key on my laptop's keyboard, MSFT literally broke the key permanently.

They changed how that key works at a low level so it cannot be cleanly remapped back to right-CTRL. This is because, unlike the CTRL, ALT, Shift and Windows keys, the now-CoPilot key no longer behaves like a modifier key. Now when you press the CoPilot key down it generates both key down and key up events - even when you keep it pressed down. You can work around this somewhat with clever key remapping in tools like AutoHotKey but it is literally impossible to fully restore that key back so it will behave like a true modifier key such as right-CTRL in all contexts. There are a limited number of true modifier keys built into a laptop. Stealing one of them to upsell a monetized service is shitty but intentionally preventing anyone from being able to restore it goes beyond shitty to just maliciously evil.

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