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Cortana Now Reminds You To Do the Things You Promised in Emails (theverge.com)

Posted by msmash on from the how-about-that dept.

From a report: Microsoft is adding a new feature to Cortana today that will remind you to keep your promises. Suggested reminders lets Cortana remind you when you've promised to do something in an email. Microsoft is using machine learning to highlight phrases in emails where you might promise your boss something, or make a commitment to a friend or family member. The result is a reminder that pops up telling you "don't forget you mentioned this." Cortana's suggested reminders will be available in the US first on Windows 10 PCs, and Microsoft is planning to bring them to iOS and Android in the coming weeks. Microsoft is supporting Outlook.com and Office 365 accounts for these reminders, and other accounts like Gmail will be supported soon. You'll need to connect an Outlook.com or Office 365 account to Cortana to enable the feature, and you'll start receiving reminders once the service detects your promises and commitments.

12 of 134 comments (clear)

  1. Remind me by Allicorn · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Remind me to disable Cortana

    --
    OMG!!! Ponies!!!
    1. Re:Remind me by The-Ixian · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It seems like personal assistants are nothing more than intrusive nag machines that want access to every aspect of my life.

      It's bad enough that I have an ongoing battle to get relevant notifications on my device from normal apps.

      The last thing I need is another app nagging me to do stuff. If I promised to do something, I will do it. Which, by the way, is why I rarely promise to do anything...

      --
      My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
    2. Re:Remind me by backslashdot · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm afraid I can't do that Dave..

    3. Re:Remind me by OhSoLaMeow · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It seems like personal assistants are nothing more than intrusive nag machines that want access to every aspect of my life.

      You mean like a wife or girlfriend?

      --
      They can take my LifeAlert pendant when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
    4. Re:Remind me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Cortana doesn't compensate you with sex.

    5. Re:Remind me by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 5, Funny

      Cortana doesn't compensate you with sex.

      Neither does a wife.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    6. Re:Remind me by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 3, Funny

      Microsoft's AI is not going to open the iPod bay doors for you! You'll have to go to the Surface.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    7. Re:Remind me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Open Task Manager, click the Details tab, find the Cortana executable, right click, click Open Location. In the File Explorer window that opens, note the subdirectory Cortana is contained in. Right click on the subdirectory, click Properties, click Security. Edit the Permissions, mark Deny for SYSTEM for the entire folder. Go back to Task Manager, right click Cortana again, click End Task. Windows will attempt at intervals to re-start Cortana and will fail because it no longer is authorized to run it. Congratulations, your computer is now Cortana-free.

  2. Nag-A-Tron 5000 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Mmm yummy a program that reads my mail and will chase me down for shit

    Where do I sign up for this abuse? (oh yeah I installed Windows 10 abuse is complimentary)

  3. Wont last by eneville · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Important things wont get done if you get reminded all the time to go back and fix all the perfect world problems that you promised yourself you'd do. Unfortunately life gets in the way and the important things quickly take priority. Being reminded to go and correct the whitespace in a random header file isn't going to help anyone.

    --
    Why UNIX?
  4. Is the scan done client-side or server-side? by mmell · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I get the impression it's done server-side and pushed to the client. I also find this just a little terrifying.

    Then again, if Google can do exactly the same thing to improve the accuracy of targeted advertising I suppose this is relatively innocuous. Still, can I meaningfully out out of should I just make sure GPG/PGP is installed and working correctly? After all, the OS itself does a couple dozen phone-homes, why should web services be any different?

  5. Microsoft LIED. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Microsoft kept telling everyone that only Google reads your email, and they don't. Now they're admitting that Cortana will read your email without your permission!