Microsoft Adding AI Key To Its Keyboard

Like everyone else, Microsoft has developed its own AI program and is pushing it aggressively on Windows 11. It’s called Copilot and apparently it’s important enough to get its own key. Microsoft hasn’t revised the standard layout of the Windows keyboard in 30 years, but they announced today they’re about to stick an AI key on them. Said key would be located on the right side, next to Alt.

So how does an AI key work? Does it negate the function of every other key on the keyboard? Do you just push it and it writes your own letter for you? Maybe on The Jetsons, but in reality, it just brings up the Copilot window, a function that doesn’t really need its own special key. The reality is, Microsoft WANTS you to believe Copilot is so indispensable to your own life that it needs one-button access instead of a mouse click that would take .05 extra seconds. That’s why it’s there — marketing.

In reality AI is a young technology which is quite imperfect. The “I” part is kind of a lie. There is no actual intelligence going on. LLMs and GPTs work by calculating data from billions of things humans have already written, and predicting the next word they should print based on what the prompt is. LLMs can do and get things wrong, and quite frequently. You’re better off ignoring the key. Hopefully it won’t be easy to hit accidentally.

As for Copilot, Microsoft’s track record with forcing products on people is rather weak. Have you ever seen someone use Bing outside of a paid placement in a teen drama from the 2000s? Have you heard of Cortana, Microsoft’s answer to personal assistants like Alexa and Siri? It should be on your Start menu somewhere, and it sits unloved. We predict the Copilot key will be the least pressed of anything in the history of key pressing.