Hi, Insiders! If you live and work in the United States, the yearly benefits’ open enrollment period can be a complicated, confusing, and intimidating time for anyone. You need to evaluate whether your current benefits meet your (and your family’s) needs now and in the future – and if not, make the necessary adjustments. That often means selecting a new plan from a multitude of options and combing through piles of paperwork. To navigate this tricky period, lean on Microsoft Copilot!

Decipher complex benefits terms

Copilot can help translate complex jargon and foreign concepts related to your healthcare options into understandable and manageable terms – just ask it what you want to know!

Sample prompt

What’s the difference between an HMO, PPO, and HDHP, and which one is best for someone who is healthy and without dependents?

Copilot’s response

Get answers related to your health and finances

If you point Copilot to specific information about your health and financial issues or priorities, it can advise you on what plan to choose or which provider has the best coverage.

NOTE: Microsoft is committed to maintaining user privacy and security. You can learn more about our data standards at Data, Privacy, and Security for Microsoft 365 Copilot.

Sample prompt

I make $100,000 a year pre-tax and spend about 40% of that on rent, utilities, and other expenses. How much should I be contributing to my 401(K) each pay cycle, and is it better if I do a traditional or Roth IRA if I’m saving for myself and my wife?

Copilot’s response

Find information on your provider

The more research you do on your health or retirement provider, the better. Copilot can assist with this task, too, whether you want to learn about the provider’s network or get in touch with a customer service specialist.

Sample prompt

My company is switching health providers from Cigna to UnitedHealthcare. Can you explain the pros/cons/differences of each, and how I should think about signing up for a specific health plan if I’m having a baby next year?

Copilot’s response

Explore options outside your company’s benefits

Sometimes, your insurance doesn’t cover something crucial – Copilot can help you find alternative options that fit your budget and preferences.

Sample prompt

My company doesn’t offer elder care support through my health plan. What are the best options for me to consider that cost the least amount?

Copilot’s response

With Copilot by your side, you’ll spend less time stressing over benefits and more time enjoying the perks. Happy enrolling!

Learn about the Microsoft 365 Insider program and sign up for the Microsoft 365 Insider newsletter to get the latest information about Insider features in your inbox once a month!

It’s been nearly 30 years since Microsoft’s Office assistant, Clippy, first graced our screens as an annoying paperclip. After the Groucho-browed interruptions of Clippy came to an end in 2001 with Office XP, Microsoft tried to revive the spirit of an assistant with Cortana on Windows Phone. The technology still wasn’t quite there a decade ago, but now Microsoft is ready to try again with Mico, a new character for Copilot’s voice mode.

“Clippy walked so that we could run,” jokes Jacob Andreou, corporate VP of product and growth at Microsoft AI, in an interview with The Verge. Microsoft has been testing Mico (rhymes with “pico”) for a few months now, as a virtual character that responds with real-time expressions when you talk to it. Mico is now being turned on by default in Copilot’s voice mode, where you’ll also have the option to turn the bouncing orb off.

“You can see it, it reacts as you speak to it, and if you talk about something sad you’ll see its facial expressions react almost immediately,” explains Andreou. “All the technology fades into the background, and you just start talking to this cute orb and build this connection with it.”

Mico will only be available in the US at launch, and this new Copilot virtual character will also rely on a new memory feature inside Copilot to be able to surface facts it has learned about you and the things you’re working on.

Microsoft is also adding a Learn Live mode to Mico that will turn the character into a Socratic tutor that “guides you through concepts instead of just giving answers.” It even uses interactive whiteboards and visual cues, and looks like it’s targeted at students preparing for finals or anyone trying to practice a new language.

Mico is all part of a goal to give Copilot an identity, as Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman alluded to earlier this year. “Copilot will certainly have a kind of permanent identity, a presence, and it will have a room that it lives in, and it will age,” said Suleyman in July.

Mico also forms a key part of Microsoft’s new initiative to get people to talk to their computers. The software maker is running ads on TV marketing the latest Windows 11 PCs as “the computer you can talk to.” Microsoft tried to convince people to use Cortana on Windows 10 PCs a decade ago, and that effort ended in the Cortana app being shut down on Windows 11 a couple of years ago.

Mico is certainly a lot more capable than Clippy or Cortana, but Microsoft will still face many of the same challenges of trying to convince people that speaking to a PC or phone isn’t weird. Just like Cortana and Clippy, Mico will also have its own Easter eggs in a renewed effort to get people to talk to an AI assistant.

“It’s funny you mention Clippy; there is an Easter egg when you get to try Mico. If you poke Mico very very quickly, something special may happen,” teases Andreou. “We all live in Clippy’s shadow in some sense.”

Correction, October 23rd: A draft Microsoft blog post mentioned Mico would be available in the US, UK, and Canada at launch. It’s only available in the US.

Microsoft is rolling out some significant changes to its Copilot AI assistant today. There’s a new groups feature that connects multiple people into a Copilot chat, memory to let Copilot learn things about you, a new “real talk” mode that will bring back some of Copilot’s early personality, and more.

Copilot Groups is designed for groups of friends, classmates, and even teammates to use Copilot in a single session. Microsoft is targeting this at people who need to make a plan or solve problems together, and the company is supporting up to 32 people in Copilot Groups, in an effort to make AI more social.

“My guess is you’re going to see groups of two or three dominate this,” says Jacob Andreou, CVP of product and growth at Microsoft AI, in an interview with The Verge. “I think it’s actually going to be a lot of small groups, it’s not going to be like your long-running group chat suddenly has an AI in it.”

While Copilot Groups sounds like it’s more ideally suited to work environments, it’s only launching inside the US consumer version of Copilot today and not the business-focused Microsoft 365 Copilot. That might change in the future, though. “I do think it’s going to be amazing in work contexts,” says Andreou. “Bringing experiences like this into Microsoft 365 are going to be really important.”

Microsoft is also adding an optional “real talk” mode to Copilot that will adapt to the way you’re asking questions and have more challenging responses. When Microsoft first launched Copilot as its Bing AI chatbot, it could often be prompted to refer to itself as Sydney and sometimes respond rudely to users. While the real talk mode doesn’t bring back the full sassiness of Sydney, it sounds like Copilot is about to get a lot more personality in its responses.

“In real talk this mode will match your tone, add its own perspective, and maybe be a little more witty than people expect,” says Andreou. “It’s also going to challenge you, so it won’t just agree with everything you say.” Real talk won’t be the default mode, it will just be another mode you select in the dropdown menu, and it’s also only limited to text and not Copilot’s voice mode.

Real talk will be able to take advantage of improvements to Copilot’s memory features, though. “Copilot is getting way better memory. It will be able to remember facts about you, the people you care about, your life, and the things you’re working on,” explains Andreou.

You’ll also be able to control what Copilot knows about you. “You’ll be able to see a list of everything Copilot knows about you, and you’ll be able to go in and delete things,” says Andreou. “We also really want to invest is doing a lot of this conversationally.” You’ll be able to use the Copilot voice mode to ask the AI assistant to forget everything it knows about your partner, for example.

Copilot is also getting changes to how it answers health-related questions by improving how it sources and grounds responses with trusted sources like Harvard Health. “Copilot also helps you find the right doctors quickly and confidently, matching based on location, language, and other preferences,” says Microsoft.

Microsoft is also updating its Copilot voice mode to introduce Mico, a new Clippy-like character. It will react with real-time expressions and bounce around a Copilot window. It also has a Learn Live mode that acts like a tutor. You can read all about Mico right here.

Pressure from Microsoft to achieve industry-topping profit margins has led to Xbox being butchered over the last two years, after not imposing specific targets on the gaming unit in the past. Citing sources with knowledge of internal matters, Bloomberg reports that Microsoft CFO Amy Hood set across-the-board targets of 30 percent profit margins in fall 2023, prompting its gaming division to respond by increasing prices, canceling projects, and laying off thousands of employees.

A 30 percent profit margin is significantly higher than average for the video game industry, analysts told Bloomberg, which typically ranges between 17 and 22 percent. By comparison, leaked documents show that Xbox hit a 12 percent margin for the first nine months of the 2022 fiscal year, prior to these latest targets.

Cost-cutting is always a fairly obvious motivation for slashing jobs and raising the price of products or services, but Microsoft’s lofty profit targets would explain why its gaming division has been so extensively gutted. During an investor call in July, Hood said that the Xbox division’s operating income had increased by 34 percent in its most recent quarter due to “continued prioritization of higher margin opportunities.”

This week, OpenAI debuted its long-rumored AI browser that aims to put its AI chatbot at the center of the internet. The browser, called ChatGPT Atlas, is entering a space that's already occupied by Perplexity's Comet and Google Gemini in Chrome. OpenAI is likely betting that putting ChatGPT front and center is enough to draw users in, but the overall experience falls short when compared to rivals so far.

The Chromium-based ChatGPT Atlas - currently exclusive to macOS, though versions for other platforms are promised - comes with a minimalist interface. On the left side of the window, you'll find a collapsible tab with your ChatGPT history. …

Read the full story at The Verge.