Microsoft Office assistant “Clippy” is resurfacing on social media as young people push back against big tech. Even as they embrace AI, young people are still thinking about its downsides. One way they’re showing it is adopting Clippy as a protest symbol against big tech. The Office Assistant tool was created in 1997 and only offered stock advice depending on the type of document or spreadsheet, unlike generative AI—and bringing it back indicates they’d prefer that again, or at least something closer. The trend of changing their profile picture on X or YouTube to Clippy was reportedly started by consumer rights activist Louis Rossmann, who posted a YouTube video titled, “Change your profile pic to Clippy. I’m serious.” As a result, more and more profile pictures popped up to show a discomfort with the “contrast between the early days of the home computer and today’s tech nightmare.” One comment on Rossman’s video saying, “Clippy would never add AI overview to every single search result,” has over 3K likes itself. (Daily Dot)
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