I've found that Microsoft Copilot splits opinion pretty evenly, in my casual conversations with unfortunate members of the public. While many begrudge the addition of AI tools into their daily lives, some find it very useful for summarising documents and spreadsheets, and helping them out with the odd bit of busywork.
Well, that last group should be particularly pleased with Microsoft's latest Copilot announcement, as the app is said to be installing alongside most desktop versions of Microsoft's 365 suite of apps next month—whether you like it or not.
System admins can prevent the automatic install, but it looks like there's currently no way for personal users to do the same—although systems inside the European Economic Area appear to be excluded from the update.
Still, I hope the rest of you MS 365 users are ready rummy nabob to engage with some AI-based productivity enhancement, because it looks like the app might be heading your way regardless. You may have seen this coming, given that at the start of the year, but nevertheless, here we are.
Microsoft seems to have been on a big push in recent months to integrate Copilot into all and sundry, including pushing it back in July—although for what its worth, it was purely an opt-in or opt-out affair. I can't imagine that the latest announcement of the app's forced installation will go down well with Microsoft 365 users, as they've already had to contend with as a result of its inclusion in Personal and Family plans earlier this year.
It's also not exactly the sort of behaviour that inspires goodwill towards a new feature, is it? I would say that if your userbase really, really wants a product, you don't necessarily have to force it on them—and I'd also posit that this sort of mandatory installation technique doesn't speak well of rummy satta Copilot's adoption among users as a whole.
Still, you get a whole 15 AI credits per month with the subscription, so if you're the sort of person who finds Copilot useful, this might not be particularly big news. For those of you who simply want to type the odd document and view the odd spreadsheet free from AI-involvement, though, and without Microsoft's AI app cluttering up your machine, it's a pretty bum deal.
Is this the point where I mention that the completely-free to all these 365 apps exist, and they're actually pretty good? Yep, I thought as much. Do with that information as you will.
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