Readers of a certain age will no doubt remember the intrusive horror of Clippy. Microsoft's overbearing office assistant made its debut back in Office 97, and would often float in the corner of the screen commenting on whatever you might be working on.
The idea was that Clippy would be able to recognise what it is you were doing and help with general formatting and other housekeeping bits and bobs. The issue, as far as I remember it, was that Clippy was almost always wrong. About everything. The only thing my Clippy ever wanted to do was help me format and write a letter. Not once was I ever trying to write a letter.
Speaking of Microsoft, take a look at our interview with Aaron Greenberg on the future of Xbox below. There are no plans for a Clippy game just yet, fortunately.
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Microsoft finally took Clippy out back put it down in 2007, and the nightmare was over. We've had nearly 15 years of uninterrupted peace, but now? Now it seems Clippy is ready to return from his slumber and irritate us with mild inconveniences once more. Gods have mercy on us all.
Over on Twitter, Microsoft threatened to bring back Clippy if their tweet got 20k likes. At the time of writing it has 127k. Clippy is coming, and we can't stop him. The only saving grace right now is that Microsoft wants to bring him back as a simple emoji, rather than restore him to his previously over-the-top functionality. Still, I can't help but feel this is just the start of a new nightmare.
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