Microsoft Office Is Now 'Microsoft 365 Copilot App' (pcgamer.com)
- Reference: 0180525985
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/26/01/06/1313225/microsoft-office-is-now-microsoft-365-copilot-app
- Source link: https://www.pcgamer.com/software/windows/in-a-truly-galaxy-brained-rebrand-microsoft-office-is-now-the-microsoft-365-copilot-app-but-copilot-is-also-still-the-name-of-the-ai-assistant/
> As spotted by Bluesky user DodgerFanLA, going to Office.com now greets you with the following helpful explainer: "The Microsoft 365 Copilot app (formerly Office) lets you create, share, and collaborate all in one place with your favorite apps now including Copilot.*"
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> Never has an asterisk been more relevant to me than following the words "your favorite apps now including Copilot."
>
> About a decade ago, hardware company Corsair attempted to pivot from its classic logo -- a subtle trio of ship sails -- to a newer, edgier look, a pair of crossed swords that gave off regrettable '2000s tribal tattoo' energy. The rebrand didn't last long: after a fierce outcry from people who correctly thought the new logo sucked, Corsair swapped to a refreshed take on the sail logo, which it's been using ever since. Corsair was established in 1994, and made about $1.4 billion last year -- which I bring up because today Microsoft, a slightly bigger company, has slipped on its own rebranding banana peel. The company is seemingly all but ditching the Office name -- which it introduced four years before Corsair existed, and which drove more than $30 billion in revenue just last quarter -- with a catchy new name: "Microsoft 365 Copilot app."
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> The company had already downplayed the Office name, despite it being perhaps the most universally recognized software in existence, by renaming its cloud version of Word, Powerpoint, etc. Office 365 in 2010, then Microsoft 365 in 2017. Now when you want to open up a Word document, you can get to them by launching the Microsoft 365 Copilot app. Intuitive!
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> Should Microsoft just go ahead and rebrand Windows, the only piece of its arsenal more famous than Office, as Copilot, too? I do actually think we're not far off from that happening. Facebook rebranded itself "Meta" when it thought the metaverse would be the next big thing, so it seems just as plausible that Microsoft could name the next version of Windows something like "Windows with Copilot" or just "Windows AI."
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> Copilot is the app for launching the other apps, but it's also a chatbot inside the apps. Any questions?
Correction : Office [3]hasn't been renamed to "Microsoft 365 Copilot app." The Verge adds:
> The confusion comes from Microsoft's own Office.com domain, which for the past year has acted as a way to push businesses and consumers to use the Microsoft 365 Copilot app. This app is a hub app that provides access to Copilot, as well as all the Office apps. Microsoft used to call this app simply Office, before the company rebranded Office to Microsoft 365 in 2022.
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> If you visit Office.com you'll see a big welcome to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app, and a note from Microsoft that would confuse anyone not following the company's confusing branding: "The Microsoft 365 Copilot app (formerly Office)..." That mention of "formerly Office" is Microsoft referring to the very old Office app that launched in 2019 as a way to try and convince people to use online versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Until a year ago it used to be called the Microsoft 365 app. Microsoft then announced it was rebranding its Microsoft 365 app in November 2024 to a Copilot one, which I and everyone else were very confused at. The new app icon and name -- Microsoft 365 Copilot -- then rolled out on January 15th last year to Windows, iOS, and Android users.
[1] https://slashdot.org/~joshuark
[2] https://www.pcgamer.com/software/windows/in-a-truly-galaxy-brained-rebrand-microsoft-office-is-now-the-microsoft-365-copilot-app-but-copilot-is-also-still-the-name-of-the-ai-assistant/
[3] https://www.theverge.com/tech/856149/microsoft-365-office-rebrand-copilot
xzibit (Score:5, Funny)
"Yo dawg! I heard you like some Copilot with your Copilot so I Copiloted your Copilot to better Copilot your Copiloting!!"
This is fantastic! (Score:5, Interesting)
As a long term Linux user I am delighted by this move on the part of Microsoft.
I suspect that at some point, even the most die-hard Windows user will tire of AI being shoved down their throat and decide to try out this "Linux thing" they've heard so much about. Given that so many Linux distros are now as easy to use as Windows (or even easier -- to the extent that my 71 year old wife uses Linux now), this will only boost the market share of the Penguin.
The other benefit is that the more people we have using Linux, the less ability big-tech will have to shift us to "hardware as a service" due to the massive costs of high-performance desktop computing systems now. NVIDIA's GeForce NOW is the perfect example of how we're increasingly being pushed to simply rent hardware rather than buy it. Today GPUs, tomorrow - entire systems because nobody can afford DRAM or a GPU that's up to the task.
I've got Linux running very happily on 3rd and 4th gen Intel i5 processors here with as little as 4GB of RAM and even my most powerful system is just an AMD 5600G with 32GB that serves perfectly well for everything but video editing.
Just keep drilling holes in the bottom of your boat Microsoft, we don't care.
Re: (Score:2)
This disproportionately impacts Linux users, actually. It's not *huge*, but in Windows, I think the experience for now is largely the same, you open up the desktop app of your choice, regardless of stupid name, browse the files through explorer even if in onedrive.
For Linux users that need to use Office apps, you use the web versions, which are generally adequate for most tasks. Now instead of getting a document oriented view to work with your files and files shared with you, you get, by default a big old c
Re: (Score:3)
"For Linux users that need to use Office apps, you use the web versions"
Alternatively don't bother using that crap and use LibreOffice instead.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, I'd like to, except:
- Impress tends to totally flub the presentations I work on
- For some reason, Calc is tortuously slow at simple things like scrolling some of the data I have, and it's not even a lot of data, and nothing so much as formulas to explain why it would be slow
- Writer flubs document formatting, though not as severely as Impress
For Impress and Writer issues, it's probably fine in and of themselves if everyone else used it instead of Microsoft software since it's more disagreement on form
Re: (Score:2)
I'd be amazed if javascript running in a browser constantly sending data back and forth down the pipe is faster than a native program but stranger things have happened.
Re:This is fantastic! (Score:5, Interesting)
Linux isn’t the problem. Getting someone to make a professional CAD software is the problem. KiCad is good enough to compete with Altium now but there isn’t anything capable of replacing SolidWorks.
Linux might be part of the problem (Score:2)
The whole reinventing the wheel (badly) nonsense with Wayland probably isn't helping bring companies who have highly complicated graphicals app to the table when they may (or may not) have to engineer them for 2 entirely different graphical systems. Yes, apparently Wayland has X compat mode though from what I've read some aspects are about as compatible as square peg -> round hole.
Re: (Score:1)
Check this out: [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
FreeCAD now can do most of what SolidWorks can. That is, if you can choose the application.
Some can also run SolidWorks in Linux, as I have heard: [2]https://github.com/cryinkfly/S... [github.com]
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEfNRST_3x8
[2] https://github.com/cryinkfly/SOLIDWORKS-for-Linux
Re: (Score:3)
I love to see increased Linux adoption as much as the next Slashdotter, but this article is about MS 365 cloud applications, not an operating system. And unfortunately, this change will affect users regardless of what OS they're using.
The year of the Linux desktop has been heralded for nearly 30 years on this site every time Microsoft makes a stupid decision, but not even this is going to drive significant numbers away from Windows.
Re: (Score:2)
I agree to most except "shoved down their throat". It feels very much like the other end.
AI obsessions across platforms (Score:2)
Except that Linux is headed down this same path. That's what the Linux Foundation is on record as saying: that 95% of their future is in AI. Only platform that is relatively AI free are the BSDs. Also, due to the fiascos w/ Apple Intelligence and Siri, Apple too is a bit less pushy about AI
It's all about the apps (Score:2)
This is going to confuse a lot of people, especially since they even renamed the apps in the app stores to Microsoft 365 Copilot
[1]https://play.google.com/store/... [google.com]
[1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft.office.officehubrow&hl=en_US
How to get everyone to use copilot: (Score:4, Funny)
Rename everything to copilot.
But will it please the investors who have seen all this money get dumped into AI, to basically have the same revenue streams as last year with a different name?
Even if they fool them it won't last very long. It just screams of desperation. Come on stupid bubble, pop already.
God is my copilot (Score:3)
The Game Overall Director controls everything!
Re: (Score:2)
It might be more appropriate so either rename it "DogShit" or spread a rumor that Linux promoters are bribing Microsoft staff to do this stupidity.
Re: (Score:2)
Why not rename Windows itself to CoPilot?
Listen closely (Score:3)
That flushing noise you just heard is the sound of decades and billions of dollars of branding swirling down the money commode.
Re: (Score:3)
Exactly what you would expect from the company that bought Nokia... seen any Nokia products lately?
return to office (Score:5, Funny)
So are you asking for a return to office ?
Reminds me of this old chestnut (Score:2)
"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo"
Now we all know this is a grammatically correct sentence.
The question is how long until "Colpilot copilot Copilot copilot copilot copilot Copilot copoliot" will take to become a complete grammatically correct sentence. I don't think we are that far away now.
Sounds like a horror movie sequel (Score:2)
"Clippy Returns!"
Re: Sounds like a horror movie sequel (Score:3)
Clippy would never . . .
Say what you like about Clippy but Clippy would never have let this happen.
Clippy would be some sort of Anti-hero in the movie, dragging himself out of the trashbin saying "it looks like you're trying to disable Copilot" and all the characters think he's going to side with the LLM and then he says "I fight for the users" and uncoils into a straight line so he can hit a pinhole reset button and then Copilot MCP gets hard reset.
Everyone cheers, and the credits start to roll, and the ca
Microsoft Shitpile (Score:3)
I'm just going to call it the Shitpile.
In a decade, when they've decided that Microsoft ActivePilot 365 Live Pro Gold fails to accurately convey the functionality of their state of the art robot that only needs 12kW seconds to accurately add two numbers, Shitpile will still be the most accurate description.
Accounting tricks (Score:2)
I think Microsoft promised investors they'd make an impossible amount of money with copilot and have realized that the only way they can follow through is to rename their entire offering.
Re: (Score:2)
I'd call it a rebranding trick, rather than as an accounting trick. Auditors are not going to look askance at this while doing the numbers
Microsoft and naming... (Score:2)
Remember Skype? No, not Skype Enterprise, that's Lync I mean the other Skype, you know the old MSN Messenger, now Teams.
Now we have Copilot, but that's not GitHub Copilot, it is more like Cortana except it is Office, or maybe 365, well, the thing Teams is now part of.
Re: (Score:2)
I want Clippy back!
You thought Ballmer was bad... (Score:2)
Nadella is really killing it. Literally.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, Ballmer at least had the sense to recognize that Windows 8 was a fiasco, and restore a semblance of the Windows 7 interface to Windows 10. Nadella has made Windows 11 a really mediocre OS
Re: (Score:1)
Business leaders are just doing their business leadership things. They innovate. There is no such as "do not fix unless broken" thing in business.
Nothing even works as a copilot (Score:1)
Theyâ(TM)ve diluted the word Copilot so much it means absolutely nothing. Copilot+ PCs exists also, not related to these. Literally nothing they produce actually fits the Copilot name or acts at a copilot. In fact if California is during Tesla for using the name Autopilot for a feature that literally replicates Autopilot as it works in planes, then this should be a slam dunk to sue on every single one of their various platforms named Copilot.
I think "Copilot" is a brand that fits Microsoft (Score:2)
No pilot in command at Microsoft, just copilots.
Office,...Microsoft,....Copilot,....whatever (Score:2)
I bought Office - Home & Student 2021 edition some years ago. Was not going to switch to a subscription model, and I don't need the latest features, even if AI weren't in the picture. In fact, the move from .doc, .xls, .ppt to .docx, .xlsx, .pptx in Office 1997 itself was pretty disruptive to me. Will just stick to what I have - a license that I bought at Costco and is now recognized in the Microsoft Account
So they can brand this whatever they like - I don't care. Only thing I use AI for is during
Found the LUDDITES! (Score:2)
Only LUDDITES use LUDDITE MS Office to create FAKE LUDDITE EXCEL APPS ! Modern app appers only use appy Copilot app to app the appiest and Copilotiest apps!
Apps! Copilot!
A branding fail so bad it makes slashdot (Score:2)
is copilot doing the marketing now?
Don't forget (Score:5, Funny)
The people that came up with this idea make more money than 99% of other humans and will retire millionaires from stock options.
Re: (Score:3)
Just got off a contract at Microsoft. Most of the rank and file workers there are just sad old men, but no means richer than 99% of other humans. In fact, they were lowballing me on my hourly rate, and that's why I quit.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
> Just got off a contract at Microsoft. Most of the rank and file workers there are just sad old men, but no means richer than 99% of other humans. In fact, they were lowballing me on my hourly rate, and that's why I quit.
You believe "rank and file workers" are the ones who choose branding strategy for a trillion dollar company?
VPs and Senior Marketing consultants get together at a $3,000 per person Visioning Retreat weekend and come up with these things.