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Office Guardian Angel Worse Than Clippy

Posted by samzenpus on from the you-never-knew-how-good-you-had-it dept.

ZWilder writes "Remember 'Clippy', the annoying anthropomorphic paper clip foisted upon unsuspecting users of Office? Well Microsoft has taken the concept behind Clippy and 'turned the dial up to 11' with its new, even more intrusive animated life-coach, known as 'Guardian Angel.' Patented in 2006, Guardian Angel is 'an intelligent personalized agent' that 'monitors and evaluates a user's environment to assist in decision-making processes on behalf of the user.' Like a manlier Fairy Godmother. Or a similarly omniscient HAL from '2001: A Space Oddysey.'"

13 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. Great... by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 5, Funny

    (User browsing some good porn.)

    Guardian Angel: "It looks like you're breaking some commandments!"

    1. Re:Great... by MRe_nl · · Score: 4, Funny

      Behind Winston's back the voice from the Guardian Angel was still babbling away about pig-iron and the over fulfilment of the Ninth Three-Year Plan. The Guardian Angel received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it, moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual Guardian Angel was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your Guardian Angel whenever they wanted to. You had to live -- did live, from habit that became instinct -- in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.

      --
      "Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
  2. April 1 by sdstuart · · Score: 4, Funny

    Well, I guess it is April 1 already in some parts of the world. Sigh. Time to turn the computer off for a day.

    --
    My SIG is a P220.
  3. Slashdot! by Gudeldar · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Slashdot: The only place where 4 year old patents are news!

  4. I used clippy a lot by 2.7182 · · Score: 4, Funny

    It had some good AI actually built into it to understand my questions. I think they actually unified two branches of AI to create it.

  5. Overblown much? by pushing-robot · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This isn't "Clippy 2.0". This is applied AI research that's more than ten years from making it into any real product, and it's a field a lot of companies are researching. From what I've read so far it's really far too vague and generic for anyone to deserve a patent on it, but the patent will probably expire before Microsoft has the opportunity to sue anyone over it.

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
  6. What are you doing, Dave? by jgreco · · Score: 4, Funny

    Please don't pull my wings off, Dave!

  7. I hope not by tpstigers · · Score: 4, Funny

    Good lord, I hope this isn't an April Fool's joke. For years I've been waiting for Microsoft to take more control over my life. When the Great Decision Engine Bing first arrived on the scene, I hoped the glorious day had finally arrived, only to have my hopes dashed when I found that Bing will only 'suggest'. PLEASE, Microsoft, save me from myself!

  8. Re:Obviously this is... by crymeph0 · · Score: 4, Informative

    I don't think Microsoft goes so far with its April Fool's jokes as to file an actual patent application.

    --
    It should be illegal to say that freedom of speech should be limited.
  9. Re:Obviously this is... by Shakrai · · Score: 5, Funny

    Why not? The current patent system reminds me of one big April fools joke.

    --
    I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
    We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  10. Re:Obviously this is... by dudpixel · · Score: 5, Funny

    offtopic i know:

    At first glance it looked like Microsoft didn’t have an april fools joke on their website today...

    But then I saw this:

    Internet Explorer 8 - faster, safer and easier than ever

    Well done Microsoft. You got me.

    --
    This seemed like a reasonable sig at the time.
  11. ATTN: MICROSOFT by lq_x_pl · · Score: 4, Insightful

    We tend to find animated "helpers" annoying. Please stop.
    Yours,
    People

    --
    An internal system operation returned the error "The operation completed successfully.".
  12. Information... by Tetsujin · · Score: 4, Funny

    Information: You are all going to die.

    --
    Bow-ties are cool.