How Will Generative AI Be Used in the Future? Answer: AutoGen

21

October

2023

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The generative AI we know of today is ChatGPT, Midjourney, and DALL·E 3 and many more. This generative AI is very good and advanced, but there are some flaws, like not being able to perform long iterations. Now there is something new called AutoGen. AutoGen is an open-source project from Microsoft that was released on September 19, 2023. AutoGen at its core, is a generative AI model that works with agents; those agents work together in loops. Agents are in essence, pre-specified workers that can become anything, so there are agents that can code well and agents that can review the generated code and give feedback. Agents can be made to do anything and become experts in any field, from marketing to healthcare.

An example of what AutoGen can do is the following: if I want to write some code to get the stock price of Tesla, I could use ChatGPT, and it will output some code. Most of the time, the code that is written by chatGPT via the OpenAI website will have some errors. But with AutoGen, there are two or more agents at work: one that will output code and the second one that is able to run the code and tell the first model if something is wrong. This process of generating the code and running the code will go on until the code works and results in the correct output. This way, the user does not have to manually run the code and ask to fix the errors or other problems with AutoGen it is done automatically.

I also tried to create some code with AutoGen. I first installed all the necessary packages and got myself an API key for openAI GPT4. Then I started working on the code and decided to create the game “Snake”. Snake is an old and easy game to create, but it might be a challenge for AutoGen. I started the process of creating the snake game, and it had its first good run. I was able to create the first easy version of the game. I then came up with some iterations to improve the game. The game now also has some obstacles that, if the snake bumps into one, the game will end. This was also made by AutoGen without any problems. After palying around, I was really amazed at how powerful this AutoGen is, and I can only imagine what else can be created with AutoGen.

AutoGen is a very promising development and will be the future of professional code development or atomization tasks. If the large language models (LLMs) get more powerful, this AutoGen will also be more powerful because all the individual agents will be more powerful. It is interesting to follow this development and see if this AutoGen could create games that are not yet existing.

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Artificial Intelligence at Student Consultant: Part 2

12

October

2023

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In part one my blogs, I introduced the AI chatbot that streamlined consultant onboarding at Student Consultant. Today, we delve deeper into the AI landscape, with a focus on Microsoft 365 Copilot, a game-changer for our consultancy which we cannot wait for.

Microsoft 365 Copilot is a virtual assistant for people working in Microsoft 365 applications and services, as well as Windows. The tool, which is going to be released in 3 weeks (Walker, 2023), after being announced by Microsoft on March 16, 2023, builds on OpenAI’s sophisticated GPT-4 large language models (LLMs) and uses Microsoft Graph to transform user text input into content for Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams (Wikipedia, 2023). You can click the following link for a short introduction on Copilot: https://youtu.be/S7xTBa93TX8.

Microsoft 365 Copilot will make sure that we never again begin from scratch. It provides the initial creative spark and provides a first draft for consultants and expansion by consultants. It can produce ideas, suggestions, and content to advance my work on a certain subject or project. Spataro (2023) claims that Word’s Copilot feature kick-starts the writing process by providing rough draughts that you can edit and modify. It keeps you in charge by allowing you to decide how it will go or give input. In addition, Copilot streamlines content generation for PowerPoint presentations by combining relevant data from previous documents or powerpoints. Data analysis and visualisation are going to be simple tasks in Excel, creating code and equations by just explaining what you want to see happen.

Every consultant, including student consultants, aims to concentrate on the most essential tasks. By performing repetitive and routine chores, Copilot streamlines work and frees up time for high-impact jobs. Outlook manages email effectively by summarising threads and recommending fast responses. By summarising talks, highlighting significant ideas, and recommending action items in real time, it transforms meetings in Teams. Beyond increasing output, Copilot improves abilities. Using natural language, it streamlines access to Microsoft 365’s extensive features. Our ability to use technology effectively will increase as a result of this transition (Spataro, 2023).

The opportunities are endless when Student Consultant adopts Microsoft 365 Copilot. It promises to profoundly alter how AI interacts with us and how we work with AI. While there may be a learning curve, those who embrace this new way of working quickly gain a competitive edge.

References

Spataro, J. (2023, March 16). Introducing Microsoft 365 Copilot – your copilot for work. Retrieved from The Official Microsoft Blog website: https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2023/03/16/introducing-microsoft-365-copilot-your-copilot-for-work/

Walker, A. (2023, October 4). Microsoft 365 Copilot: Confirmed release date and what we know so far. Retrieved October 12, 2023, from Android Authority website: https://www.androidauthority.com/microsoft-365-copilot-release-date-3355464/

Wikipedia. (2023, April 1). Microsoft 365 Copilot. Retrieved from Wikipedia website: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_365_Copilot

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Digitalizing Mid-Size Companies: harnessing the power of Microsoft Power Automate and ChatGPT

3

October

2023

No ratings yet.

The past pandemic has accelerated digitalization within the business (Amankwah‐Amoah et al., 2021). Not only was there an explosion in online sales (U.S. Census Bureau, 2023), but more and more organizations were using platforms such as Microsoft Teams or Slack to collaborate digitally (Zaveri & Gould, 2020). As the pandemic came to an end, all kinds of companies of various sizes and industries faced their next challenge – a shortage of staff (Randstad & Randstad, n.d.). Digital skills and a strong digital foundation are now more important than ever to stay competitive.

To support organizations in this, Microsoft jumped into an important gap. With its far-developed ecosystem Office 365, now better known as Microsoft 365, manages to support both SMEs and Multinationals in its operations. A platform such as Microsoft Power Automate is a low-threshold empowering hand from Microsoft to accelerate digitization and thus efficiency. Power Automate, formerly known as Microsoft Flow, is a Cloud-based service that allows users to automate time-consuming (repetitive) business tasks and processes within and outside the Microsoft ecosystem in a practical and easy way (Microsoft, 2023). Examples of these tasks include, for example, automatically saving attachments from emails, sending push notifications within teams, or creating flows for approvals (Microsoft, 2023).

Of course, Power Automate cannot be left behind when it comes to emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI). So, in September, Microsoft announced an integration with ChatGPT (MatoW, 2023). The Power Automate plugin for ChatGPT makes it possible to create direct cloud flows based on a conversation within ChatGPT (MatoW, 2023). To take advantage of this feature you need to have a subscription to OpenAI, ChatGPT Plus. To make ChatGPT work for you, you need to start a prompt with creating a flow or automation and clearly stating what you want to achieve. Then ChatGPT can create a flow in your own environment (MatoW, 2023).

(MatoW, 2023a)

Besides using it to create new flows, you can also use the plugin to lose possible errors in your own built flow and use ChatGPT as a tool. Personally, I have used the latter application myself during my work to extract XML files from an automated mail from another department, save it to a SharePoint environment, and then merge it into a weekly total file.

The integration between Microsoft Power Automate and ChatGPT makes it possible for anyone to become an expert in process automation and thereby speed up business operations. In particular, the technology will be able to make a difference within mid-size organisations that can automate a high number of repetitive tasks to save their resources.

References

Amankwah‐Amoah, J., Khan, Z., Wood, G., & Knight, G. (2021). COVID-19 and digitalization: The great acceleration. Journal of Business Research, 136, 602–611. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2021.08.011

MatoW. (2023a). Create a Flow Power Automate – Chat GPT. Microsoft.

MatoW. (2023b, September 21). Use the Power Automate plugin for ChatGPT – Power Automate. Microsoft Learn. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-automate/use-chatgpt-plugin

Microsoft. (2023). Power Automate | Microsoft Power Platform. https://powerautomate.microsoft.com/en-us/

Randstad & Randstad. (n.d.). Randstad. www.randstad.com. https://www.randstad.com/workforce-insights/talent-acquisition/why-there-a-global-labor-shortage/

U.S. Census Bureau. (2023, June 12). Annual Retail Trade Survey shows impact of online shopping on retail sales during COVID-19 pandemic. Census.gov. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/04/ecommerce-sales-surged-during-pandemic.html

Zaveri, P., & Gould, S. (2020, May 2). These charts show how use of Microsoft Teams, Slack, and Zoom has skyrocketed thanks to the remote work boom. Business Insider. https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-teams-slack-zoom-usage-charts-increased-remote-work-pandemic-2020-4?international=true&r=US&IR=T

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Seeing AI: “a Swiss Army knife of apps”

11

October

2022

5/5 (1)

Have you ever seen the sunlight? Yes, you have, and I have too, but some people in the world have not … people with visual impairment.
Blind people are missing lots of things in life that we as clear-sighted people can clearly see and enjoy.
Small things in life such as looking at photos, seeing the color of your child’s eyes, or paying the right bills. We can see it every day, but visually impaired people can’t.
Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and organization on the planet to achieve more. And working on a technological tool that could help millions of visually impaired people around the world, would be a game changer for many lives.

Do you know someone who is blind?….. I didn’t know anyone who is blind. But now I know. This is André Louis, he is a British young man, married and he has two kids. And he loves music. But he couldn’t see anything (‘Seeing AI App’, n.d.).
But now he has Microsoft’s app called: “Seeing AI”.
In short, Andre names it: “…an app that you can read almost anything anywhere with.”. It has multiple functions, eight in total, and they all work together to produce something that you can use whether you need it. Andre calls it: “a Swiss Army knife of apps”. He uses the ‘short text’ function the most, to read short texts on signs in London. He even put the phone on the window of a car or bus to see all the signs next to the road. He feels like he is seeing everything with this app, not hearing, but seeing. A very important aspect of life is money, and with the Seeing AI app Andre can know in which currency he is paying, so he can pay for his groceries by himself now.
This is a perfect example of AI doing good, and empowering blind people to achieve more in life.
And the most beautiful quote of Andre is that he said that “Seeing AI is like having someone who can see in your pocket”. This app changes someone’s life and empowers them to do more things in life. Seeing AI is now available in a few languages, but if it can improve over time, many more languages are to come.
Next to the inspiring part of this app, the AI department from Microsoft can use all the data, to work more on AI and use it for other software applications (‘Seeing AI App’, n.d.).

References:

Seeing AI App. (n.d.). Retrieved 11 October 2022, from https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/ai/seeing-ai

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Could Google, Apple, Facebook or Amazon make you knock on a stranger’s door?

3

October

2019

No ratings yet. Big surprise… Yes! They can. They already made millions of people doing this. But what is really happening here?

When I was watching a video of Roger McNamee (former mentor of Mark Zuckerberg) and Edward Roussel (Dow Jones Chief Innovation Officer) at the Digital Marketing Exposition and Conference they pointed out that Pokemon Go was basically the first indirect test of Google trying to manipulate and steer human behavior in an utterly new way. People that were/are using the Pokemon Go app were indeed knocking on doors of strangers, since they really badly wanted that very special Pokemon that was located in the garden of their neighbors. Next to that, the makers of this app could even make you go into a school or a Starbucks etc. You see the point.

Every hour, big companies receive tonnes of data about us and our behavior. But still I hear people say: “I don’t care what companies do with my data”, and that made me think. It is of course really convenient to have apps in your life that support you in the best way possible, like Google maps that knows exactly where your home and work address is and therefore this app can help you to quickly navigate to those places. Or even one step further, Google tracks your location and sees exactly where you are at any time, but for you as a user it’s also great to see where you have been.. This information is not new, but it keeps me thinking of how much data big established companies actually receive, for example, Walmart collects more than 2.5 petabytes of data every hour from its customer transactions (McAfee et al, 2012), and probably that has more than doubled as of today.

But what actually got my attention was the fact that big established firms can go one step further: they can make you move in a physical way! This could really be a very effective means for digital marketing right? So by gamifying processes (like the Pokemon Go app) you can actually manipulate human behavior. But if that’s possible, what will happen in the long run?

There are roughly four companies in the world that control most of our data, but just imagine what they can do with all of that information. For example, the Oxfort Internet Institute (2019) found out that manipulation on social media has got worse – “rising numbers of governments and political parties making cynical use of social media algorithms, automation and big data to manipulate public opinion at scale.” Striking facts, and we also haven’t forgotten the Cambridge Analytica scandal in recent history. Hub firms are big enough, they don’t need others (Iansiti & Lakhani, 2017), they can make you do a lot in the future… like moving you to a special location with an exclusive ceremony to get your iPhone one day earlier than the official release date as part of you being loyal to brand. Just a random idea, but there are endless possibilities.

I think we should be way more careful in how we share our data across platforms, since it can be of real monetary value for such companies, confirmed by the fact that companies pay a lot for valuable data. And as Roger McNamee (video) pointed out, “we shouldn’t view data as an asset and we shouldn’t be able to buy and sell your own data,  it is part of your bodily organ.”

What do you think about these risks of big firms going steps further in terms of what they do with your data and what should we do to get our customer power back?

If you have some spare time, here is the video:

References: 

McAfee, A., Brynjolfsson, E., Davenport, T. H., Patil, D. J., & Barton, D. (2012). Big data: the management revolution. Harvard business review, 90(10), 60-68.

Iansiti, M., & Lakhani, K. R. 2018. Managing our hub economy. Harvard Business Review, 96(1), 17-17.

TechCrunch. (2019). Voter manipulation on social media now a global problem, report finds – TechCrunch. [online] Available at: https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/26/voter-manipulation-on-social-media-now-a-global-problem-report-finds/ [Accessed 22 Sep. 2019].

YouTube. (2019). Big tech under observation – after years of watching us, is now being watched | 2019. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aM55qkIt14 [Accessed 14 Sep. 2019].

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The Globalisation of Data

16

October

2017

No ratings yet. After having read the news article ‘Supreme court will hear U.S.-Microsoft battle over email’ on the website of USA today, I started wondering about the question whether data should be location-bound or not (USA Today, 2017).

Using this ‘battle’ as example, I would like to discuss the topic of globalization of data and share my thoughts on it in this blog. But firstly, let me give a brief summary of the U.S vs. Microsoft case: The FBI requested to see email stored by Microsoft for an investigation. However, Microsoft claims that the FBI does not have the authority to request that, since the email are stored on a database in Ireland and therefore are not on American soil. Both Microsoft and the U.S. government have been ruled in favour by different judges, so now the upper court is going to take on the case and make a final ruling.

There are three different viewpoints regarding this case:
(1) People who believe the supreme court should rule in favour of the U.S government.
(2) People who believe the supreme court should rule in favour of Microsoft.
(3) People who believe the supreme court should not have taken on this case at all.

So, why do these groups believe they are right and the others are not?

The first group says that it is the government’s responsibility to investigate and prosecute crimes and to fend off terrorism and other kinds of threats to national security. By not being able to get a hold of those emails, this group believes the government won’t be able to do this and thus is it a threat to national security and public safety. They claim that this will make it easy for terrorist to avoid the US government, because they simply need to make sure their messages are stored in databases which are not located in the US (Reuters, 2017).

The second group claims that if the US government will be able to receive information about non-US citizens which is stored outside the US, this can also be done by other countries to US citizens. Also, they believe that this would interfere with the privacy of citizens and that countries should respect each other’s sovereignty (Bloomberg, 2017).

The third group believes that courts cannot come up with a suitable ruling for this case based on the current legislation. They claim that congress should first come up with new legislation that is more suitable for the time we live in, since the current legislation on this topic is still from the time of the floppy disc (USA Today, 2017).

Personally, I think that data should be location bound to the country where it is stored due to privacy reasons and that governments should work together to ward off terrorism. Meaning that this kind of information only gets shared when both countries agree that it is relevant for the investigation, instead of the US government being able to retrieve all information stored by American companies. Especially since these American companies, like Google and Microsoft, are active in so many countries and possess so much information about citizens of those countries. What about you? What are your thoughts on this topic?

Hurley, L. (2017, October 16). U.S. Supreme Court decide major Microsoft email privacy fight. Retrieved October 16, 2017, from reuters.com: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-microsoft/u-s-supreme-court-to-decide-major-microsoft-email-privacy-fight-idUSKBN1CL20U

Stohr, G. (2017, October 16). Microsoft Email-Access Fight with U.S. Gets Top Court Review. Retrieved October 16, 2017, from Bloomberg.com: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-16/microsoft-email-access-fight-with-u-s-gets-supreme-court-review

Wolf, R. (2017, October 16). Supreme Court will hear U.S.-Microsoft battle over emails. Retrieved October 16, 2017, from usatoday.com: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/10/16/supreme-court-hear-u-s-microsoft-battle-over-emails/761346001/

 

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Spotify Defeated Microsoft’s Groove Music

9

October

2017

No ratings yet. Have you ever heard of Groove Music? Probably not. Groove Music is a digital music streaming service owned by Microsoft, where users can purchase songs or buy streaming subscription. Groove Music was first launched by Microsoft in 2012 as Xbox Music, and earlier got renamed as a part of rebranding strategy. Users of Microsoft 10 operating system have probably seen Groove Music on their laptops, as it came preinstalled.

Despite Microsoft’s attempt to make their music service widely accepted, the company announced in October 2017 that it will kill the service on the upcoming New Year’s Eve (Fingas, 2017). Groove was unable to compete with Spotify, and Microsoft’s officials have been honest acknowledging their loss. They publicly confirmed that the customers wanted “access to the best streaming service, the largest catalogue of music, and a variety of subscriptions” (Roetgers, 2017), which Groove service was unable to provide. In order to make Groove’s customers a bit happier, Microsoft has partnered with Spotify to allow them to transition their music collection and playlists to the Spotify service.

Microsoft has shown its weakness in making technology for consumers. It has never released specific user numbers or revenue for the Groove service (Weinberger, 2017), which makes us think that the numbers were not worth being mentioned. Despite its technological wisdom, Microsoft was unable to compete, as it seeks to partner with Spotify instead of creating its own rival services (Warren, 2017). Unlike the past, there isn’t another Microsoft-branded service waiting in the wing.

Meanwhile, Spotify has once again confirmed its winner-take-all position. Music streaming market is characterized by low demand for differentiated services since one platform typically has all music genres; high strength of network effects for both users and studios; and high multi-homing costs as users must purchase subscription for each service. Therefore, competing with a leader in this market is extremely difficult, which is confirmed by Microsoft’s example. Multiple tech experts have confirmed that Microsoft has wasted resources in Groove Music, and it should have quitted earlier (BBC, 2017). With Microsoft’s exit, Spotify has won huge chunk of consumers, who will boost its leadership position even further.

Do you think Microsoft had chances to beat Spotify with Groove? What has it done wrong?

 

References:

BBC, (2017). Microsoft axes Groove Music service. Available from: <http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-41483492> Accessed [09-10-2017].

Fingas, J., (2017). Microsoft gives up on Groove Music, switches customers to Spotify. Avaiable from: <https://www.engadget.com/2017/10/02/microsoft-drops-groove-music-in-favor-of-spotify/> Accesses [09-10-2017].

Roetgers, J. (2017). Microsoft Discontinues Groove Music, Partners With Spotify Instead. Available from: <http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/microsoft-groove-music-dead-1202578189/> Accessed [09-10-2017].

Warren, T., (2017). Microsoft retires Groove Music service, partners with Spotify. Available from: <https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/2/16401898/microsoft-groove-music-pass-discontinued-spotify-partner> Accessed [09-10-2017].

Weinberger, M., (2017). Microsoft is killing its Spotify competitor, will partner up with Spotify instead. Available from: <https://www.businessinsider.nl/microsoft-discontinuing-groove-music-pass-2017-10/?international=true&r=US> Accessed [09-10-2017].

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The Rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) with Microsoft & Co.

2

October

2016

5/5 (10)

“The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race”

– Stephen Hawking

 

Five of the world’s biggest technology companies announced this week that they will work together in order to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Microsoft, Facebook, Google’s DeepMind, IBM, and Amazon will tackle the issues behind the safety, privacy, and collaboration between humans and AI. Moreover, Microsoft revealed yesterday that they have formed a 5,000-person engineering and research division focused on the matter.

 

The idea of living in a world alongside artificial intelligence seemed a reality far from our lifetime, something belonging to science fiction. However, today AI has already become part of our daily lives.

 

For those unfamiliar with the term “artificial intelligence”, it is defined as the theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence. Basically, it’s smart software that enables machines to mimic human behavior.

 

Much like in the movies “Terminator”, “A.I. Artificial Intelligence”, and “I, Robot”, AI is usually portrayed as robots with human-like characteristics, but in fact it encompasses all systems. Apple’s SIRI and self-driving cars are already examples of current artificial intelligence, except they are properly referred to as weak AI (or narrow AI), which is AI designed to only perform narrow tasks (e.g. internet searches or voice recognition). The long-term goal, however, is to create strong AI (or artificial general intelligence, AGI) that could outperform humans in almost every cognitive task.

 

This unsurprisingly raises many concerns, which is why these five companies hope to maximize AI’s potential and to ensure its benefits to the world by conducting research in the following areas:

  • Ethics, fairness and inclusivity
  • Transparency
  • Privacy and interoperability (how AI works with people)
  • Trustworthiness, reliability and robustness

 

Despite the obvious advantages that AGI would offer, from facilitating daily human tasks to overcoming human limitations (e.g. space exploration), perhaps one of the biggest argument is still revolved around its ethical and moral values. In sci-fi movies, the AI systems usually end up trying to dominate the humans. Although these are a bit exaggerated, Tom Dietterich (president of the Association for the Advancement of AI) explains that computers won’t just take over the world someday, unless we design them to. Which begs the question, what if one day someone does design them to do so? Additionally, Dietterich stresses that we should also never make AI systems fully autonomous (fully independent of human control) in order to avoid such problems.

 

Whether you are for or against AI, its rapid development is inevitable. However, will its benefits truly outweigh its consequences? Personally, I do not believe that we can live in a world where human intelligence is outperformed by superior intelligent systems without any unforeseen risks. No matter how safely designed these machines are, they could always end in up the wrong hands. It may seem a minor problem if your laptop crashes or gets hacked, but it’s more serious if an AI system takes over your car, airplane, home, or trading systems. Or worse, imagine losing control of lethal autonomous weapons, which can select and engage targets without human intervention.

 

Bim IS Post 1

“[AI] is potentially more dangerous than nukes” – Elon Musk

Related Articles:

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37494863

http://futureoflife.org/background/benefits-risks-of-artificial-intelligence/

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/tech-must-look-to-past-to-protect-the-future-from-an-artificial-intelligence-apocalypse-2016-09-29

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/09/30/artificial-intelligence-a-five-point-plan-to-stop-the-terminator/

http://www.techinsider.io/autonomous-artificial-intelligence-is-the-real-threat-2015-9

http://www.toptechnews.com/article/index.php?story_id=00100015QK07

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/pros-and-cons-of-artificial-intelligence.html

http://content.wisestep.com/advantages-disadvantages-artificial-intelligence/

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Microsoft will pay you to use its new W10 Edge browser

27

September

2016

5/5 (8) It is common knowledge that the competition to win over the market of Internet browser has been fierce in the past, and Google Chrome has conquered the biggest share of the pie starting from June 2012. Several newcomers have unsuccessfully tried to enter this market, which then appeared to be at a stable and mature stage.

Browser mkt share_Aug16

…Are browser wars really over?

 

Microsoft would certainly not agree. With the launch of its new Windows 10 Operating System in July 2015, the tech giant has released the first version of Microsoft Edge: This is a desktop browser which is promoted as faster, more battery-efficient, safer and all-round better than competitors. A distinctive feature of it is the ability to quickly scribble and annotate on webpages and the possibility to enhance searches with the voice assistance Cortana. However, Edge still has a long way to go before conquering the market also because it is currently available only for computers running Windows 10 (differently from competitors who run on multiple editions of rival OSs): its overall market share is 5% (vs 52% of Chrome’s market share), but only 25% of W10 computers are currently using Edge as browser despite it being the initial default option.

 

The stickiness of the browser market is linked to the concept of Network Effects: the bigger is the users’ base, the more will be the developers (providers of content running on or adjusted for a determined browser, or companies willing to spend money to advertise their products on a determined browser), the higher will be the value of the platform. This is a feedback loop that increases the switching costs of the parties, and makes it harder to change the status quo. And this is why Chrome market share has kept on growing.

 

In order to attack this issue, Microsoft has launched a program that allows users to gain financial benefits from using Edge: The purpose is to bring on-board enough users so as to trigger a new feedback loop on its newly-launched browser. This program is called Microsoft Rewards (formerly Bing Rewards) and is currently only available in the USA: People using Microsoft Edge as browser, Bing as default search engine and Windows Store for the apps, will be able to accumulate points. These points will then be traded in for credits or vouchers to vendors such as Amazon, Skype, Starbucks, Xbox, and the advertisement-free version of Outlook.com.

 

Users will be monitored by Microsoft in order to ensure that they are using the Edge browser for as many as 30 hours per month by tracking signs such as mouse movements to make sure that they are not cheating. However, no precise conversion system of points per hour of usage has yet been specified, apart from the statement that every 1$ spent in the Microsoft/Windows Store corresponds to “at least 1 point”.

 

At this point we should question ourselves: seeing as Edge is a technically good product, will the tactic of paying users be able to break the ‘great wall of Chrome’ and gradually increase Microsoft Edge’s users base and market  share in the browser industry?

 

 

REFERENCES:

  1. Microsoft Edge: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/microsoft-edge#JW7akzYofWQ3oeyE.97. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  2. Microsoft Rewards: https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/html/pbPage.Rewards. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  3. Computer world: Edge’s weak adoption contributes to Microsoft’s declining browser share:  http://www.computerworld.com/article/3029631/web-browsers/edges-weak-adoption-contributes-to-microsofts-declining-browser-share.html . Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  4. Express: Microsoft will now PAY YOU to use its unpopular Windows 10 web browser: http://www.express.co.uk/life-style/science-technology/702570/Windows-10-Microsoft-Edge-Failure-Pay-Rewards. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  5. NetMarketShare: Market share of desktop browser: http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=0&qptimeframe=Q. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  6. SitePoint: Browser wars trends September 2016: https://www.sitepoint.com/browser-trends-september-2016-browser-wars/. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  7. Tech Times: Microsoft Will Pay You To Use The Windows 10 Edge Browser: Here Are The Details: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/174361/20160820/microsoft-will-pay-you-to-use-the-windows-10-edge-browser-here-are-the-details.htm. Last visited on 26/9/2016.
  8. The guardian: Microsoft paying to use Edge: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/aug/19/microsoft-windows-10-browser-edge-pay-users-bing. Last visited on 26/9/2016.

 

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Microsoft reprimanded by judge

9

September

2014

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Yesterday, Microsoft got reprimanded by a New York federal Judge. The reason for this is the fact that Microsoft refused to share e-mail data, which is stored in Europe. The government of the USA wants those e-mails for further investigation.

The request for the e-mail data was already approved by a federal Judge in december 2013. Though, Microsoft has been fighting against this request ever since. The government states that “They have the right to request, and investigate, all data of American companies”. This includes the data which is not stored in the USA itself. Microsoft, on the other hand, states that this request is against international laws en treaties, and it’s a direct insult on the privacy of civilians and companies a like.

Microsoft doesn’t stand alone in this lawsuit. American provider Verizon, and several privacy organisations support Microsoft in their defense. Governments outside of the USA also support Microsoft.

The company states that the digital world should have the same rules and laws as the real world. Which would mean that the USA needs evidence and a strong suspicion, before it has the right to request private e-mails.

This example proves that privacy, in- and outside of the digital world, is a huge issue at the moment. The European Union wants to forbid companies to sell private information to third parties, and has also started the conversation with the USA about the privacy of their civilians (right after Snowden showed the world what really happens with our data).

 

My question to you is as follows: Under what circumstances is it, in your opinion, justified for governments to request and investigate private data like e-mails?

Sources

http://www.nu.nl/internet/3872789/microsoft-berispt-niet-overhandigen-e-mails-vs.html

http://www.law360.com/technology/articles/575248

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/29/us-usa-microsoft-emails-idUSKBN0GT2GV20140829

http://www.nutech.nl/internet/3799131/microsoft-blijft-vechten-dataverzoek-vs-europese-e-mail.html

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