The Thought Process May Be a Problem: Microsoft and Copilot Fees
February 4, 2025
Yep, a dinobaby wrote this blog post. Replace me with a subscription service or a contract worker from Fiverr. See if I care.
Here’s a connection to consider. On one hand, we have the remarkable attack surface of Microsoft software. Think SolarWinds. Think note from the US government to fix security. Think about the flood of bug fixes to make Microsoft software secure. Think about the happy bad actors gleefully taking advantage of what is the equivalent of a piece of chocolate cake left on a picnic table in Iowa in July.
Now think about the marketing blast that kicked off the “smart software” revolution. Google flashed its weird yellow and red warning lights. Sam AI-Man began thinking in terms of trillions of dollars. Venture firms wrote checks like it was 1999 again. Even grade school students are using smart software to learn about George Washington crossing the Delaware.
And where are we? ZDNet published an interesting article which may have the immediate effect of getting some Microsoft negative vibes. But to ZDNet’s credit the write up “The Microsoft 365 Copilot Launch Was a Total Disaster.” I want to share some comments from the write up before I return to the broader notion that the “thought process” is THE Microsoft problem.
I noted this passage:
Shortly after the New Year, someone in Redmond pushed a button that raised the price of its popular (84 million paid subscribers worldwide!) Microsoft 365 product. You know, the one that used to be called Microsoft Office? Yeah, well, now the app is called Microsoft 365 Copilot, and you’re going to be paying at least 30% more for that subscription starting with your next bill.
How about this statement:
No one wants to pay for AI
Some people do, but these individuals do not seem to be the majority of computing device users. Furthermore there are some brave souls suggesting that today’s approach to AI is not improving as the costs of delivering AI continue to rise. Remember those Sam AI-Man trillions?
Microsoft is not too good with numbers either. The article walks through the pricing and cancellation functions. Here’s the key statement after explaining the failure to get the information consistent across the Microsoft empire:
It could be worse, I suppose. Just ask the French and Spanish subscribers who got a similar pop-up message telling them their price had gone from €10 a month to €13,000. (Those pesky decimals.)
Yep, details. Let’s go back to the attack surface idea. Microsoft’s corporate thought process creates problems. I think the security and Copilot examples make clear that something is amiss at Microsoft. The engineering of software and the details of that engineering are not a priority.
That is the problem. And, to me, it sure seems as though Microsoft’s worse characteristics are becoming the dominant features of the company. Furthermore, I believe that the organization cannot remediate itself. That is very concerning. Not only have users lost control, but the firm is unconsciously creating a greater set of problems for many people and organizations.
Not good. In fact, really bad.
Stephen E Arnold, February 4, 2025
Microsoft and Bob Think for Bing
February 4, 2025
Bing is not Google, but Microsoft wants its search engine to dominate queries. Microsoft Bing has a small percentage of Internet searches and in a bid to gain more traction it has copied Google’s user interface (UI). Windows Latest spills the tea over the UI copying: “Microsoft Bing Is Trying To Spoof Google UI When People Search Google.com."
Google’s UI is very distinctive with its minimalist approach. The only item on the Google UI is the query box and menus along the top and bottom of the page. Microsoft Edge is Google’s Web browser and it is programed to use Bing. In a sneaky (and genius) move, when Edge users type Google into the Bing search box they are taken to UI that is strangely Google-esque. Microsoft is trying this new UI to lower the Bing bounce rate, users who leave.
Is it an effective tactic?
“But you might wonder how effective this idea would be. Well, if you’re a tech-savvy person, you’ll probably realize what’s going on, then scroll and open Google from the link. However, this move could keep people on Bing if they just want to use a search engine. Google is the number one search engine, and there’s a large number of users who are just looking for a search engine, but they think the search engine is Google. In their mind, the two are the same. That’s because Google has become a synonym for search engines, just like Chrome is for browsers. A lot of users don’t really care what search engine they’re using, so Microsoft’s new practice, which might appear stupid to some of you, is likely very effective.”
For unobservant users and/or those who don’t care, it will work. Microsoft is also tugging on heartstrings with another tactic:
“On top of it, there’s also an interesting message underneath the Google-like search box that says “every search brings you closer to a free donation. Choose from over 2 million nonprofits. This might also convince some people to keep using Bing.”
What a generous and genius tactic! We’re not sure this is the interface everyone sees, but we love the me too approach from monopolies and alleged monopolies.
Whitney Grace, February 4, 2025
Microsoft and Security: What the Style Guide Reveals
January 29, 2025
A blog post written by a real and still-alive dinobaby. If there is art, there is AI in my workflow.
If you have not seen the “new” Microsoft style guide, you will want to take a quick look. If you absorb the document, you might qualify to write words for Microsoft. I know that PR and marketing are important. We have had some fun trying to get Visio to print after the latest unwanted update. Some security issues exist for a number of Microsoft products and services. Do you want “salt” on your solar windburn?
With security in mind, I wanted to see what the style guide offers the Microsoftie trying to learn. Using the provided search system, I saw 29 entries about security. These came from “documentation.” Yep, zero references to security, how to handle it, what to say, the method of presenting security information, nada. A Microsoftie or a curious dinobaby like me would not see the word security in the style guide’s information for:
- Credentials
- Q&A
- Reference
- Shows
- Training
Was I surprised? No, a style guide is not focused on security. But I think some discussion of the notion of security and how to respond when an all-to-frequent breach is discovered would be useful. I make this remark because the top dogs of Microsoft said security was Job One … at least until AI, Copilot, and trying to recoup costs became Job One with a gold star.
Does anyone care? Not too much.
Stephen E Arnold, January 29, 2025
Microsoft Still Searching after All These Years
January 28, 2025
Finally, long-suffering Windows users will get a better Windows Search. But only if they are willing to mix AI with their OS. The Register reports, "Improved Windows Search Arrives… But Only for Copilot+ PCs." Reporter Richard Speed writes:
"Windows Search has been the punchline to many a Windows joke over the years. The service is intended to provide an easy way of finding content on a local machine, and has previously been mocked for being slow and unreliable. It was blamed for various failures, from causing high CPU usage and toppling over when bits of infrastructure had issues, to tripping up other applications, such as Outlook. Microsoft is making improvements in the latest Dev Channel release – although only for Copilot+ PCs – and is ‘introducing semantic indexing along with traditional indexing.’ This means typing some natural phrases into the Windows search box on the taskbar or searching in File Explorer, which will produce a list of documents that include items close to or related to the search terms."
For now, Windows Search continues to only work on files stored locally. However, Microsoft plans to expand that to documents in the cloud in a future release. The firm promises "no data gathered during the indexing is sent to the company or used to train AI models." Sure.
How many search systems does Microsoft have? How many work as users expect? Our suggestion: Use Everything search. Not only does that freeware tool work well, it does not require one to embrace AI to function. Oh, Microsoft, keep searching. One day you may find a way to locate information in a Windows system. Maybe?
Cynthia Murrell, January 28, 2025
Microsoft and Its Me-Too Interface for Bing Search
January 22, 2025
Bing will never be Google, but Microsoft wants its search engine to dominate queries. Microsoft Bing has a small percentage of Internet searches and in a bid to gain more traction it has copied Google’s user interface (UI). Windows Latest spills the tea over the UI copying: “Microsoft Bing Is Trying To Spoof Google UI When People Search Google.com.”
Google’s UI is very distinctive with its minimalist approach. The only item on the Google UI is the query box and menus along the top and bottom of the page. Microsoft Edge is Google’s Web browser and it is programed to use Bing. In a sneaky (and genius) move, when Edge users type Google into the bing search box they are taken to UI that is strangely Google-esque. Microsoft is trying this new UI to lower the Bing bounce rate, users who leave.
Is it an effective tactic?
“But you might wonder how effective this idea would be. Well, if you’re a tech-savvy person, you’ll probably realize what’s going on, then scroll and open Google from the link. However, this move could keep people on Bing if they just want to use a search engine.Google is the number one search engine, and there’s a large number of users who are just looking for a search engine, but they think the search engine is Google. In their mind, the two are the same. That’s because Google has become a synonym for search engines, just like Chrome is for browsers.A lot of users don’t really care what search engine they’re using, so Microsoft’s new practice, which might appear stupid to some of you, is likely very effective.”
For unobservant users and/or those who don’t care, it will work. Microsoft is also tugging on heartstrings with another tactic:
“On top of it, there’s also an interesting message underneath the Google-like search box that says “every search brings you closer to a free donation. Choose from over 2 million nonprofits.” This might also convince some people to keep using Bing.”
What a generous and genius tactic interface innovation. We’re not sure this is the interface everyone sees, but we love the me too approach from user-centric big tech outfits.
Whitney Grace, January 22, 2025
A Monopolist CEO Loses His Cool: It Is Our AI, Gosh Darn It!
December 17, 2024
This blog post flowed from the sluggish and infertile mind of a real live dinobaby. If there is art, smart software of some type was probably involved.
“With 4 Words, Google’s CEO Just Fired the Company’s Biggest Shot Yet at Microsoft Over AI” suggests that Sundar Pichai is not able to smarm his way out of an AI pickle. In January 2023, Satya Nadella, the boss of Microsoft, announced that Microsoft was going to put AI on, in, and around its products and services. Google immediately floundered with a Sundar & Prabhakar Comedy Show in Paris and then rolled out a Google AI service telling people to glue cheese on pizza.
Magic Studio created a good enough image of an angry executive thinking about how to put one of his principal competitors behind a giant digital eight ball.
Now 2025 is within shouting distance. Google continues to lag in the AI excitement race. The company may have oodles of cash, thousands of technical wizards, and a highly sophisticated approach to marketing, branding, and explaining itself. But is it working.
According to the cited article from Inc. Magazine’s online service:
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had said that “Google should have been the default winner in the world of big tech’s AI race.”
I like the “should have been.” I had a high school English teacher try to explain to me as an indifferent 14-year-old that the conditional perfect tense suggests a different choice would have avoided a disaster. Her examples involved a young person who decided to become an advertising executive and not a plumber. I think Ms. Dalton said something along the lines “Tom would have been happier and made more money if he had fixed leaks for a living.” I pegged the grammatical expression as belonging to the “woulda, coulda, shoulda” branch of rationalizing failure.
Inc. Magazine recounts an interview during which the interlocuter set up this exchange with the Big Dog of Google, Sundar Pichai, the chief writer for the Sundar & Prabhakar Comedy Show:
Interviewer: “You guys were the originals when it comes to AI.” Where [do] you think you are in the journey relative to these other players?”
Sundar, the Googler: I would love to see “a side-by-side comparison of Microsoft’s models and our models any day, any time. Microsoft is using someone else’s models.
Yep, Microsoft inked a deal with the really stable, fiscally responsible outfit OpenAI and a number of other companies including one in France. Imagine that. France.
Inc. Magazine states:
Google’s biggest problem isn’t that it can’t build competitive models; it’s that it hasn’t figured out how to build compelling products that won’t destroy its existing search business. Microsoft doesn’t have that problem. Sure, Bing exists, but it’s not a significant enough business to matter, and Microsoft is happy to replace it with whatever its generative experience might look like for search.
My hunch is that Google will not be advertising on Inc.’s site. Inc. might have to do some extra special search engine optimization too. Why? Inc.’s article repeats itself in case Sundar of comedy act fame did not get the message. Inc. states again:
Google hasn’t figured out the product part. It hasn’t figured out how to turn its Gemini AI into a product at the same scale as search without killing its real business. Until it does, it doesn’t matter whether the competition uses someone else’s models.
With the EU competition boss thinking about chopping up the Google, Inc. Magazine and Mr. Nadella may struggle to get Sundar’s attention. It is tough to do comedy when tragedy is a snappy quip away.
Stephen E Arnold, December 17, 2024
Microsoft: That Old Time Religion Which Sort of Works
November 15, 2024
Having a favorite OS can be akin to being in a technology cult or following a popular religion. Apple people are experienced enthusiasts, Linux users are the odd ones because it has a secret language and handshakes, while Microsoft is vanilla with diehard followers. Microsoft apparently loves its users and employees to have this mantra and feed into it says Edward Zitron of Where’s Your Ed At? in the article, “The Cult Of Microsoft.”
Zitron reviewed hundreds of Microsoft’s internal documents and spoke with their employees about the company culture. He learned that Microsoft subscribed to “The Growth Mindset” and it determines how far someone will go within the hallowed Redmond halls. There are two types of growth mindset: you can learn and change to continue progressing or you believe everything is immutable (aka the fixed mindset).
Satya Nadella even wrote a bible of sorts called Hit Refresh that discusses The Growth Mindset. Zitron purports that Nadella wants to setup himself up as a messianic figure and used his position to claim a place at the top of the bestseller list. How? He “urged” his Microsoft employees to discuss Hit Refresh with as many people as possible. The communication methods he had his associates use was like a pyramid scheme aka a multi-level marketing ploy.
Microsoft is as fervent of following The Growth Mindset as women used to be selling Mary Kay and Avon products. The problem, Zitron reports, is that it has little to do with actual improvement. The Growth Mindset can’t be replicated without the presence of the original creator.
“In other words, the evidence that supports the efficacy of mindset theory is unreliable, and there’s no proof that this actually improves educational outcomes. To quote Wenner Moyer:
‘MacNamara and her colleagues found in their analysis that when study authors had a financial incentive to report positive effects — because, say, they had written books on the topic or got speaker fees for talks that promoted growth mindset — those studies were more than two and half times as likely to report significant effects compared with studies in which authors had no financial incentives.’
Turning to another view: Wenner Moyer’s piece is a balanced rundown of the chaotic world of mindset theory, counterbalanced with a few studies where there were positive outcomes, and focuses heavily on one of the biggest problems in the field — the fact that most of the research is meta-analyses of other people’s data…”
Microsoft has employees write biannual self-performance reviews called Connects. Everyone hates them but if the employees want raises and to keep their jobs then they have to fill out those forms. What’s even more demeaning is that Copilot is being used to write the Connects. Copilot is throwing out random metrics and achievements that don’t have a basis on any facts.
Is the approach similar to a virtual pyramid scheme. Are employees are taught or hired to externalize their success and internalize their failures. If something the Big Book of MSFT provides grounding in the Redmond way.
Mr. Nadella strikes me as having adopted the principles and mantra of a cult. Will the EU and other regulatory authorities bow before the truth or act out their heresies?
Whitney Grace, November 15, 2024
Is Telegram Inspiring Microsoft?
November 6, 2024
You’d think the tech industry would be creative and original, but it’s exactly like others: everyone copies each other. The Verge runs down how Microsoft is “inspired” by Telegram in: “Microsoft Teams Is Getting Threads And Combined Chats And Channels.” Microsoft plans to bring threads and combine separate chats and channels in the Teams communications app. These changes won’t happened until 2025. These changes are similar to how Telegram already operates.
Microsoft is updating its UI, because of negative feedback from users. The changes will make Microsoft Teams easier to use and more organized:
“This new UI fixes one of the big reasons Microsoft Teams sucks for messaging, so you no longer have to flick between separate sections to catch up on messages from groups of people or channels. You’ll be able to configure this new section to keep chats and channels separate or enable custom sections where you can group conversations and projects together.”
Team will include more updates, including a favorites section to pin chats and channels, view customizations such as previews, single lists, and time stamps, and highlighting conversations that mention users. Microsoft Teams is actively listening to its end users and making changes to improve their experience. That’s a really good business MO, because many tech companies don’t do that.
It begs the question, however, if Microsoft is copying Telegram’s threaded conversations. Probably. But who is going to complain?
Whitney Grace, November 6, 2024
Hey, US Government, Listen Up. Now!
November 5, 2024
This post is the work of a dinobaby. If there is art, accept the reality of our using smart art generators. We view it as a form of amusement.
Microsoft on the Issues published “AI for Startups.” The write is authored by a dream team of individuals deeply concerned about the welfare of their stakeholders, themselves, and their corporate interests. The sensitivity is on display. Who wrote the 1,400 word essay? Setting aside the lawyers, PR people, and advisors, the authors are:
- Satya Nadella, Chairman and CEO, Microsoft
- Brad Smith, Vice-Chair and President, Microsoft
- Marc Andreessen, Cofounder and General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz
- Ben Horowitz, Cofounder and General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz
Let me highlight a couple of passages from essay (polemic?) which I found interesting.
In the era of trustbusters, some of the captains of industry had firm ideas about the place government professionals should occupy. Look at the railroads. Look at cyber security. Look at the folks living under expressway overpasses. Tumultuous times? That’s on the money. Thanks, MidJourney. A good enough illustration.
Here’s the first snippet:
Artificial intelligence is the most consequential innovation we have seen in a generation, with the transformative power to address society’s most complex problems and create a whole new economy—much like what we saw with the advent of the printing press, electricity, and the internet.
This is a bold statement of the thesis for these intellectual captains of the smart software revolution. I am curious about how one gets from hallucinating software to “the transformative power to address society’s most complex problems and cerate a whole new economy.” Furthermore, is smart software like printing, electricity, and the Internet? A fact or two might be appropriate. Heck, I would be happy with a nifty Excel chart of some supporting data. But why? This is the first sentence, so back off, you ignorant dinobaby.
The second snippet is:
Ensuring that companies large and small have a seat at the table will better serve the public and will accelerate American innovation. We offer the following policy ideas for AI startups so they can thrive, collaborate, and compete.
Ah, companies large and small and a seat at the table, just possibly down the hall from where the real meetings take place behind closed doors. And the hosts of the real meeting? Big companies like us. As the essay says, “that only a Big Tech company with our scope and size can afford, creating a platform that is affordable and easily accessible to everyone, including startups and small firms.”
The policy “opportunity” for AI startups includes many glittering generalities. The one I like is “help people thrive in an AI-enabled world.” Does that mean universal basic income as smart software “enhances” jobs with McKinsey-like efficiency. Hey, it worked for opioids. It will work for AI.
And what’s a policy statement without a variation on “May live in interesting times”? The Microsoft a2z twist is, “We obviously live in a tumultuous time.” That’s why the US Department of Justice, the European Union, and a few other Luddites who don’t grok certain behaviors are interested in the big firms which can do smart software right.
Translation: Get out of our way and leave us alone.
Stephen E Arnold, November 5, 2024
Windows Fruit Loop Code, Oops. Boot Loop Code.
October 8, 2024
Windows Update Produces Boot Loops. Again.
Some Windows 11 users are vigilant about staying on top of the latest updates. Recently, such users paid for their diligence with infinite reboots, freezes, and/ or the dreaded blue screen of death. Digitaltrends warns, “Whatever You Do, Don’t Install the Windows 11 September Update.” Writer Judy Sanhz reports:
“The bug here can cause what’s known as a ‘boot loop.’ This is an issue that Windows versions have had for decades, where the PC will boot and restart endlessly with no way for users to interact, forcing a hard shutdown by holding the power button. Boot loops can be incredibly hard to diagnose and even more complicated to fix, so the fact that we know the latest Windows 11 update can trigger the problem already solves half the battle. The Automatic Repair tool is a built-in feature on your PC that automatically detects and fixes any issues that prevent your computer from booting correctly. However, recent Windows updates, including the September update, have introduced problems such as freezing the task manager and others in the Edge browser. If you’re experiencing these issues, our handy PC troubleshooting guide can help.”
So for many the update hobbled the means to fix it. Wonderful. It may be worthwhile to bookmark that troubleshooting guide. On multiple devices, if possible. Because this is not the first time Microsoft has unleased this particular aggravation on its users. In fact, the last instance was just this past August. The company has since issued a rollback fix, but one wonders: Why ship a problematic update in the first place? Was it not tested? And is it just us, or does this sound eerily similar to July’s CrowdStrike outage?
(Does the fruit loop experience come with sour grapes?)
Cynthia Murrell, October 8, 2024
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