Clippy Is Back, And This Time As An AI Assistant (But Not Microsoft’s)

Artificial intelligent assistants are all the rage right now. You have ChatGPT, Bing, Bard, and just about an unaccountable handful of others popping up in all corners of the internet. But have we forgotten the first digital assistant, Clippy? The one that often grounded our gears, but at the end of the day, was merely just trying to help?

 
Ah, Clippy, the annoying and yet lovable Microsoft Office Assistant who was supposed to make life easier but only made him more complicated as you couldn’t get him off the screen.

After Clippy’s retirement in 2003, he slipped into a part of pop culture that soon had people turning him into a historic meme. Microsoft brought the assistant back in 2019 and promptly removed him the same day he made his return, and then reintroduced him as an emoji in 2021. And just last year, Clippy was seen gracing the boxes of Oreo Thins after a collaboration between Microsoft and Nabisco came about to encourage employees to take breaks.
 
Now, in an unauthorized Microsoft app by Firecube, Clippy is back again. This time, his new role is as a ChatGPT interface that can help answer your most pressing questions. That said, it probably won’t be making an official return with Microsoft’s incoming CoPilot AI system that can answer your questions and perform tasks for you. Still, it could be nice having a friendly face around again.
 
If you’re interested in resurrecting Clippy, you will need an API key that will identify and link your OpenAI account.
 
 
 
[via Futurism and PC World, images via Firecube / Microsoft App Store]