Microsoft is hellbent on stuffing Windows 11 with AI — and many feel that this is coming at the expense of the operating system’s usability.
That aggrieved sentiment now seems more vindicated than ever, after Microsoft rolled out a new update that prevented users from shutting down their PCs — a core functionality that there should be zero excuses for not working.
The patch, released on January 13, was the first security update of the new year, and ultimately created more issues than it fixed. As Microsoft tells it, a bug related to its System Guard Secure Launch security feature was preventing users from shutting down or hibernating their PCs, and instead caused them to get stuck in an endless shutdown loop in which they either didn’t finish the process and stayed powered on, or simply restarted. This created a potential security risk for devices left unattended, not to mention an unnecessary strain on the power bill.
To fix the issue, Miscrosoft rushed out a emergency out-of-band update this Saturday, a typically rare intervention that these days is feeling more and more common, The Verge noted in its coverage. And while the scale of the issue does not appear to be outright disastrous — as only PCs installed with an older edition of Windows 11, 23H2, and specifically the Enterprise or IoT editions, were affected — it’s nonetheless an embarrassingly glaring oversight.
“When you vibe code an OS,” joked one Redditor, mocking Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s boast that as much as 30 percent of the company’s code is now written with AI.
The buggy update comes as Microsoft is facing more and more heat for its Ahabian monomania for AI. Executives at the company have described turning Windows 11 into an “agentic OS” and even a full-blown “canvas for AI.” These changes have included stuffing Microsoft’s AI chatbot Copilot in the OS’ file explorer, and testing features like Copilot Vision and Copilot Actions, which collectively allow the AI to analyze user’s screens to perform tasks on their behalf. The company has also frequently experimented with new ways of shoving a button for Copilot into the system’s interface.
It’s not surprising, then, that earlier this month, the term “Microslop” went viral online. It was a direct response to Nadella’s plea that we should stop using the slang “slop,” the recently crowned word-of-the-year for describing the shoddy text, images, and videos mass produced by AI models.
Ironically, Microsoft’s obsession with AI also appears to be blowing back on the employees building it, as The Verge reported last week that the company was shutting down its Redmond HQ library in favor of pursuing an “AI-powered learning experience.”
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