Business

Microsoft’s new AI could revolutionize the way we work

AI nerds have been talking about this one for a while, and for a good reason. Your CEO may be thinking about adding Microsoft Copilot to your company’s enterprise subscription. Even if that isn’t the case, you should know about this (possibly) revolutionary product.

Copilot is powered by ChatGPT, and designed to save you a huge portion of time by turning Word documents into PowerPoint presentations, drafting email responses, summarizing video meetings, and automating other tasks within the Microsoft 365 suite, among other things.

Those interested will have to buy a minimum of 300 user licenses (for $30 each) to add the software to their Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 subscriptions, including the existing subscription fees of $36 and $57 a month per person, respectively.

The AI community has dubbed it many things, but Gizmodo described Copilot as “Clippy if he went to get his MBA,” referencing the paper clip Microsoft used as a digital assistant back in 1997.

A New Frontier

Microsoft is the first major company to utilize ChatGPT by integrating it into a hugely popular business software product. Some claim this gives them the “first-mover advantage”, similar to what Apple had with the launch of the first iPhone.

A few top-earning US companies got early access to Copilot months ago, with one claiming the tool saved them five to 10 hours per month, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Piper Sandler analysts forecasted the AI-powered tool could earn Microsoft over $10 billion in yearly revenue by 2026, with the Co-Head of Technology Research, Brent Bracelin, claiming it “could change work forever.” Hopefully, that’s the case, because I’m tired of sorting Excel files.

Tech and Hollywood CEOs get some lavish perks

Those behind your favorite content get some pretty bizarre perks. The few at the top of the corporate ladder have sown some pretty nice rewards on top of millions in salary and stock each year, according to a report by the Hollywood Reporter.

Security and flying fees make sense, but how much do they cost? Meta takes the top spot for security and flight funding for Mark Zuckerberg, with $25 and $2.3 million, respectively. I would’ve thought Zuck’s Jujitsu skills could spare him $20 million, but I guess not. He spent more on security than every other CEO (on the list) did on travel fees and security combined.

• In comparison, Netflix head Reed Hastings was the only other CEO who spent $1 million-plus in company cash for air travel.

• Security-wise, Jeff Bezos spent $1.6 million, while Apple CEO Tim Cook spent a mere $591,000, showing just how serious Zuck takes his safety.

Some rather unusual costs can be seen with AMC Networks and Sphere owner James Dolan, who spent roughly $600,000 on his private helicopter use last year. Lionsgate CEO John Felthiemer paid $16,000 in country club membership fees, though I really can’t say I blame him.

Other weird company costs can be attributed to theme park tickets for Disney execs, home internet expenses, which Discovery provides compensation for, and physical examinations for video game publisher Electronic Arts executives. Who would ever turn down a free physical?

HBO CEO had to apologize for trolling on Twitter

HBO CEO Casey Bloys had employees make secret accounts to troll critics of his shows. Nice. Bloys led off a presentation on 2024 programming Thursday by apologizing, addressing a Rolling Stone report that unearthed texts between him and HBO’s senior VP, Kathleen McCaffery, discussing a “secret army” that could respond to critics that gave their shows negative reviews.

Bloys had to face the same critics he admitted to harassing on the app, telling them he “had progressed over the past couple of years to using DMs” instead. He also apologized to those who were leaked in the emails and texts, saying “nobody wants to be involved in a story they had nothing to with” after admitting guilt to hiring them to be a part of his self-proclaimed “secret army”.

• McCaffery, HBO’s Senior Vice-President said in a text “I f****** hate these people,” when discussing critics of the show.

One of the employees tasked with sending tweets, Sully Temori, is filing a wrongful termination suit against HBO, claiming that he was harassed after he faced a mental health diagnosis, further muddying the waters for HBO’s head Casey Bloys.

Miscellaneous

Hezbollah pledges to stay out of the Israel-Hamas war, for now

Hezbollah earlier threatened to join the fight, but the US presence in the region complicates things. In his first speech since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah called the assault “glorious” but didn’t explicitly say he’d join the conflict immediately.

Hezbollah considers itself to be Iran’s strongest ally and has a stronger and larger military presence than Hamas. They control an arsenal of an estimated 130,000 rockets and missiles, including thousands of fighters with years of experience in Syria.

The world is watching the Iran-backed group’s steps closely, as their involvement in the fight could escalate it into a wider regional war in the Middle East. The US-designated terrorist group faces growing pressure from its own ranks and Palestinian groups inside Lebanon to respond more forcefully to Israel’s offensive in Gaza, mounting even more concerns from the West.

Goodbye, daylight savings?

Daylight Savings has a case against it, and it might be pretty solid. This past Sunday, many of us probably enjoyed getting that extra hour of sleep. However, as America gets turned back an hour, there’s a large group making a case against daylight savings.

Whether it be sleep doctors, industry groups, parents with small children, or lawmakers, the biannual change to and from daylight savings time (DSL) is irritating at best and pretty harmful at worst.

• Experts say time changes harm our health, with studies showing an increase in health issues, car accidents, and even stock market losses in the period after DST takes place.

If it’s so bad why haven’t we gotten rid of it? Well, history shows it doesn’t go well. Following a national experiment in 1974, the US hurriedly went back to including DST as citizens across the country were concerned about their kids going to school in the dark. So much for having sunlight past 4:30.

Why might DST be so bad?

A huge reason for DST was the energy-saving benefits, a belief that goes all the way back to a founding father…kind of. Benjamin Franklin is often (falsely) credited with supplying the inspiration for DST.

While he never said anything about setting clocks an hour forward every spring, he did satirically advocate for cannons to wake the public closer to dawn so that people could save candles due to extra sunlight time in the afternoon.

• The real inspiration goes back to WWI when the US and other industrial nations set back the clock to conserve energy.

Anyways, there is contradicting data on whether DST actually saves energy, given the need for AC in the summer, for example.

However, we haven’t gotten to the biggest reason why DST can be so detrimental. The most alarming con is that it messes with your sleep. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine vehemently disagrees with the Sunshine Protection Act. They argue for making standard time permanent instead.

• Sleep specialists worry that the switch to DST disrupts our circadian rhythm, the typical 24-hour cycle in which our body operates. They claim that standard time is more in sync with our biological clocks.

• They also warn that disrupted sleep cycles lead to higher chances of obesity, heart disease, and diabetes.

Making DST permanent instead of adjusting to standard time as the year-round clock setting would have the biggest effect on Northern states, where winter mornings are darker.

There are a few places in the US where DST has been abandoned, though. Hawaii, several US territories, and most of Arizona have abandoned daylight savings time. I think they’re normal enough, right?

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Grab Bag

A new hope for humanity? Or is it just mice?

A newborn mouse has officially done more in its life than I ever will. For the first time in history, astronauts have successfully developed a mouse embryo aboard the International Space Station.

This is an indication that larger mammals (us) will be able to reproduce off-Earth. The research was led by Japanese scientists who sent 720 frozen two-cell mouse embryos to the ISS, and 23.6% of them kept growing successfully.

• While that figure doesn’t touch the 61.2% control rate back on Earth, the researchers said “gravity had no significant effect” on embryo development.

• This means we are one step closer to living, and procreating, on other planets or in space.

Space.com said this represents "the first-ever study that shows mammals may be able to thrive in space," the University of Yamanashi and National Research Institute Riken said in a joint statement on Saturday. Essentially, this means I’m becoming friends with Richard Branson and setting up a flight ASAP… time for a Martian wife.

The newest vacation destination isn’t on Earth, it’s on Fortnite

If you’re wondering why your kid was “sick” on Friday, this is why. Epic Games’ Fortnite Battle Royale started its new season by bringing back the beloved “OG Map” which caused a massive surge in players who broke the record for unique accounts online in one day.

Fortnite re-released its old map from 2018, causing a huge number of people to get genuinely emotional (sad warning) over the times they used to spend on it with their friends.

The re-release brought in an astounding 44.7 million players on Saturday, a record for the game, and players logged 102 million hours of play during the same time; according to the official Fortnite X account.

Ninja, the Twitch streamer whose fame was partly fueled by Fortnite, reached 118,000 concurrent viewers — dwarfing the size of his normal audience.

However, the nostalgia won’t last forever, the map is only set to be in the game for a few weeks, and then Epic Games has other plans in store for the dedicated player base that has come back in flocks to play it in record numbers.

Snippets

Rogan Rampage: Joe Rogan shot the side of a Cybertruck with a compound bow, and it barely dented it. Tesla said good riddance to Robin Hood.

Booty Bumper: A man was arrested in Florida for driving a “Booty Patrol” truck, which highly resembled a Border Patrol vehicle, alarming authorities and leading to his arrest.

Superbowl Spenders: The football craze is already taking hold because CBS reported they’re “virtually sold out” of 2024 Superbowl ads already, much earlier than usual.

Corrupted Color: Some of the rainbow is missing? Here’s an explanation of what’s happening.

AI Rival: Elon Musk unveiled ‘Grok’ AI to (compete?) with ChatGPT.

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