This Microsoft UI Assistant can attend a meeting for you

Microsoft 365 Copilot can summarize meetings held in Teams for those who do not attend. It can also instantly draft e-mail messages, create text documents, graphs, spreadsheets and Powerpoint presentations.

At Microsoft, they hope that the tool will eliminate "hard work", but some worry that such technology will replace employees.

There are also concerns that companies could become too bigč dependent on the help provided by artificial intelligence.

Both the European AI Act and China's AI regulations stipulate that people must know if they are interacting with AI rather than humans.

Collette Stallbaumer, head of Microsoft 365, said that an individual using Copilot needs to clarify this.

"It is a tool and people have a responsibility to use it responsibly,” she said.

"Maybe when I send you this answer, I won't tell you that I'm for help used artificial intelligence in the generation. But čman is always present and always in control."

Regardless, the EU states that companies developing artificial intelligence tools must ensure their responsible use.

A BBC journalist had an exclusive opportunity to test Copilot before its wider rollout.

It uses the same technology behind ChatGPT created by OpenAI – a company in which Microsoft has invested billions of dollars.

The tool was tested on the laptop of Derek Snyder, a Microsoft engineer, because Copilot is embedded in an individual's account with access to their own or company data.

Microsoft says the data is secure and will not be used to train the tool.

"You only have access to data that you should be able to see," said Stallbaumer. "Copilot respects the data usage policy."

The first impression of Copilot is that it will certainly be a useful tool, but also an extremely competitive colleague for those who do office work - especially in companies that want to save.

A BBC journalist reported on how he confidently summarizes a long chain of e-mail messages related to the launch of a fictional product in seconds.

He then suggested a short answer. They used a simple drop-down menu to make this response longer and more casual, and the Chatbot generated a warm response expressing admiration for the proposed ideas and excitement to be involved in the project – Although none of them have read anything of this.

They could then choose to edit the email before sending, or choose an AI-generated suggestion and send it in its entirety. There was no indication in the email that it contained Copilot content.

A BBC journalist witnessed the process of how the tool creates a Powerpoint presentation with more than one Word document in about 43 seconds. slides. You can use the images embedded in the document, or explore your own free collection. During testing, Copilot created a simple yet effective presentation of – and also wrote a text proposal that was intended for the presentation.

As the journalist adds, Copilot did not understand the request to make the presentation more "colorful". The Microsoft tool even referred him back to Powerpoint tools to fix things himself.

At the end of the testing, the team looked at the functionality of the meeting in Microsoft Teams.

The copilot defined the topics and offered summaries of the various topics that emerged during the meeting. According to the BBC portal, Copilot could also summarize what a certain person said and, in case of disagreement, it could offer the pros and cons of the discussed topics in the form of a chart. All this took the tool just a few seconds.

Copilot was programmed not to answer questions about the performance of individuals in meetings – for example, who was the best speaker (or the worst). Mr. Snyder was asked if he thought anyone would actually make the effort to attend meetings if they realized Copilot could save them time and effort. "Many meetings could become webinars,” he joked.

Copilot will initially cost $30 per month, but it will need to be connected to the Internet to function, as it does not work offline.

Critics say that this type of technology is likely to cause major disruptions, especially in the area of administrative jobs. Carissa Veliz, an associate professor at the University of Oxford's Institute for Ethics in Artificial Intelligence, said she also worries that people are becoming too much. dependent on such tools. "What happens if the technology fails or gets hacked? There may be an error, or the introduction of a new policy that you may not agree with. And then, if you are so addicted to the system that you think I can't do it anymore. without it, what happens next?” she said.