Forcing Copilot AI

Thomas Claburn (Hacker News, Slashdot):

Among the software developers who use Microsoft’s GitHub, the most popular community discussion in the past 12 months has been a request for a way to block Copilot, the company’s AI service, from generating issues and pull requests in code repositories.

The second most popular discussion – where popularity is measured in upvotes – is a bug report that seeks a fix for the inability of users to disable Copilot code reviews.

Both of these questions, the first opened in May and the second opened a month ago, remain unanswered, despite an abundance of comments critical of generative AI and Copilot.

Sergiu Gatlan (Hacker News):

“Starting in October 2025, Microsoft will begin automatically installing the Microsoft 365 Copilot app on Windows devices [outside Europe] that have Microsoft 365 desktop client apps,” the company said in a Microsoft 365 message center update on Friday.

[…]

While the newly installed app will be added to the Windows Start Menu and enabled by default, IT administrators responsible for managing Microsoft 365 app deployments will be able to opt out in the Apps Admin Center.

Pierre Igot:

Once Microsoft introduced its AI crap (Copilot) in its Office apps and forced me to pay for the “upgrade”, even though it initially was possible to completely turn it off, I knew it wouldn’t take long before it would invade my work environment.

Sure enough, a couple of months later, even though I still have everything turned off under “Privacy”, I now have all kinds of Copilot-related controls in PowerPoint that I cannot remove or make disappear. (And of course they don’t work.)

Pierre Igot:

Example of Copilot now interfering with my work in Microsoft PowerPoint even though I’ve turned off everything I could: If the text spills beyond the frame at the bottom, the floating button that I cannot turn off hides the left side of the text.

Emma Roth (Slashdot):

Microsoft Excel is testing a new AI-powered function that can automatically fill cells in your spreadsheets, which is similar to the feature that Google Sheets rolled out in June. You would use the “COPILOT” function followed by a natural language prompt and (optionally) specify the cells you want it to reference; the AI would then classify information, generate summaries, create tables, and more.

[…]

Microsoft notes that you can combine its new AI function with other Excel functions, including IF, SWITCH, LAMBDA, or WRAPROWS. The company adds that information sent through Excel’s COPILOT function is “never” used for AI training, as “the input remains confidential and is used solely to generate your requested output.”

The COPILOT function comes with a couple of limitations, as it can’t access information outside your spreadsheet, and you can only use it to calculate 100 functions every 10 minutes. Microsoft also warns against using the AI function for numerical calculations or in “high-stakes scenarios” with legal, regulatory, and compliance implications, as COPILOT “can give incorrect responses.”

Dare Obasanjo:

This is going to cause some hilarious and disastrous results as people inevitably forget about hallucinations and use this to crunch numbers.

Avram Piltch:

As of the latest Windows Insider Dev and Beta builds, the “Ask Copilot anything” box is available if you know how to switch it on.

Though it’s off by default, using the Copilot search box feels like glancing into the future. As Microsoft has become more aggressive about pushing its AI services, we can totally see this becoming a default part of the UI.

Previously:

• AI in Microsoft Edge
• Microsoft 365 Copilot
• GitHub Copilot Is Generally Available

Artificial Intelligence Copilot AI GitHub GitHub Copilot Microsoft Excel Microsoft Office Microsoft PowerPoint Microsoft Word Web Windows 11

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