Actual Ad Link: https://www.instagram.com/microsoft365/p/C7j8ipnxIiI/?img_index=1
Awesome article about the ad which sums it up nicely:
https://justinpot.com/watch-me-be-in-three-meetings-at-once/
Three meetings at once. It’s so funny that, when I saw people making fun of it, I assumed it was a meme or an Onion parody. Nope: Microsoft really did run this as an ad on Instagram. This is what they think we want from their supposedly world-changing technology: the ability to attend more meetings.
Now, Copilot’s ability to transcribe a meeting and highlight the key points is cool, and in theory it could make meetings more efficient. It’s easy to imagine, in a healthy work culture, where that gain in time allows people to spend more time doing the actually productive parts of their job.
Instead this ad assumes the opposite will happen. It imagines a future where we use our efficiency gains to attend more meetings. Economists sometimes talk about how the current crop of technology hasn’t lead to commensurate productivity gains—it’s a bit of a mystery in some circles. I would hold up this ad as the explanation: we are all, as a society, using the efficiency gains to attend more pointless meetings.
Some asshole on LinkedIn is creaming his khakis over this
Absolutely stunned by Microsoft’s Copilot! Finally, a tool that understands the art of multitasking at an unheard-of level! Can’t wait to revolutionize my workflow and lead the charge toward a more efficient future. #GameChanger #ProductivityPerfection
#CreamedKhakis
It’s easier to understand this through the lens of the bosses who actually buy this technology. They’re only in meetings. They kind of assume that’s what their workers do, too. They want their workers in more meetings; if that’s all you’re doing, it sounds like being productive.
The workers aren’t buying copilot, and the people who are buying it find this somewhat convincing.
Matches my experience in bigger companies. People who have a “mostly meetings and PowerPoint” job think that sitting in meetings is real productive work. They assume anyone who sits in front of a computer but not in a meeting is probably not busy enough and their job could be outsourced to India.
Oh boy, three fistfights at once!
She’s a goddamn fucking gem, I love her. She has a bunch of great TikToks and is a super smart lawyer. She don’t miss
*doesn’t
Even the woman on the ad looks “whelmed” and disappointed in the world of tech. I feel like behind those eyes there are thoughts of quitting and moving to Idaho to raise sheep.
Definitely looks like the AI has been sending her transcripts of the vacation it’s been attending with her family.
Not exactly related to this, but I can’t wait for our eventual AI avatars to sit in meetings for us so they can lay us off and have our AI avatar literally take our job, likeness, and persona.
As someone familiar with Microsoft’s meeting culture, this is pretty accurate. If you want to attend every meeting in the day, you will be in three meetings at once. At a minimum.
I don’t want to be even in one meeting at a time without camera on.
Remember when AI was going to free us up to do better things? LOL just kidding, 3 meetings at once.
That last section of the article you highlighted makes me think about Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber. Imagine if everyone going to bullshit meetings actually did something productive for society, or did something that they themselves found fulfilling. Makes me sad.
Imagine if everyone going to bullshit meetings actually did something productive for society, or did something that they themselves found fulfilling.
At some point I’ve decided this is at least 25% of the point of most of the Star Trek storylines, and I’m here for it, sadness and all.
So Copilot is going to make me a transcript of a meeting that could have just been an email to begin with? Brilliant.
It makes sense if you assume it’s actually targeted at managers who want their employees to be in three meetings at once.
