Early Adopters of Microsoft’s AI Bot Wonder if It’s Worth the Money


微软为其畅销软件新推出的AI助手已经在测试者手中使用了六个多月，他们的评价是：有用，但有点配不上它的价格。



微软(Microsoft)为其畅销软件新推出的AI助手已经在测试者手中使用了六个多月，他们的评价是：有用，但有点配不上它的价格。 6park.com
Microsoft’s new artificial-intelligence assistant for its bestselling software has been in the hands of testers for more than six months and their reviews are in: useful, but often doesn’t live up to its price. 6park.com
    
微软希望整合了Copilot的Microsoft 365能成为其数十年来最成功的产品之一。这是一项可为Word、Outlook和Teams嵌入AI功能的升级，采用了与OpenAI的ChatGPT相同的技术，可以根据自然语言提示总结电子邮件内容、生成文本和创建文档。 6park.com
The company is hoping for one of its biggest hits in decades with Copilot for Microsoft 365, an AI upgrade that plugs into Word, Outlook and Teams. It uses the same technology as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and can summarize emails, generate text and create documents based on natural language prompts. 6park.com
   
参与测试的公司表示，他们的员工已经在积极测试该工具，至少一开始是如此。到目前为止，Excel和PowerPoint等软件的不足之处以及容易出错的问题让一些测试人员产生了疑虑：每月每人30美元的价格是否物有所值？ 6park.com
Companies involved in testing say their employees have been clamoring to test the tool—at least initially. So far, the shortcomings with software including Excel and PowerPoint and its tendency to make mistakes have given some testers pause about whether, at $30 a head per month, it is worth the price. 6park.com
    
网络硬件公司瞻博网络(Juniper Networks)的首席信息官Sharon Mandell表示：“我不认为我们已经准备好为公司的每个用户花费30美元。”该公司去年11月开始测试Copilot。 6park.com
“I wouldn’t say we’re ready to spend $30 per user for every user in the company,” said Sharon Mandell, the chief information officer at networking hardware company Juniper Networks, which has been testing Copilot since November. 6park.com
    
微软已表示，来自用户的初步需求之高前所未见，测试该系统的公司都认为它有价值。该公司尚未透露参与测试的具体情况。 6park.com
Microsoft has said that early demand from users is unprecedented and the companies testing it have found it valuable. The company hasn’t shared specifics about sign-ups. 6park.com
    
微软相信该公司能够引领AI的发展，并已对此押下数以十亿美元计的赌注，尤其是通过对OpenAI的130亿美元投资。由于投资者相信AI技术将带动微软的收入激增，该公司股价一路飙升，成为全球市值最大的公司。该公司的广告四年来首次出现在周日举行的美国超级碗橄榄球赛(Super Bowl)中，这则广告将Copilot宣传为可以帮助年轻人实现创业梦想的工具。 6park.com
The company has bet billions—notably through its $13 billion investment in OpenAI—that it can lead the way in AI. Its shares have soared on the belief that the technology will turbocharge its revenue, making it the most valuable company in the world. On Sunday, it showed its first Super Bowl ad in four years, touting Copilot as a tool that can help young people realize their entrepreneurial dreams. 6park.com
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加拿大皇家银行资本市场(RBC Capital Markets)的分析师Rishi Jaluria说：“Copilot必须取得成功，股价才能上涨。” 6park.com
“Copilot has to be a success for the stock to work,” said Rishi Jaluria, an analyst with RBC Capital.


微软CEO纳德拉。

在微软最近的财报电话会议上，Copilot被提及超过50次。微软首席执行官纳德拉(Satya Nadella)将其比作个人电脑在工作场所的应用。 6park.com
During Microsoft’s recent earnings call, Copilot was mentioned more than 50 times. Chief Executive Satya Nadella likened it to the adoption of the personal computer in workplaces.  6park.com
    
他说：“我们已经从谈论AI进展到大规模应用AI了。” 6park.com
“We’ve moved from talking about AI to applying AI at scale,” he said.  6park.com
   
微软此前的AI升级成果喜忧参半。2022年，该公司发布了GitHub Copilot，该功能利用AI帮助程序员加快编写代码的速度。微软的高管表示，该功能的起价为每月10美元，目前已有130万用户，比此前一个季度增长30%。 6park.com
Microsoft’s earlier AI upgrades have had mixed results. In 2022, the company released GitHub Copilot, which helps programmers write code faster using AI. The feature, which starts at $10 a month, has 1.3 million subscribers—up 30% from the previous quarter, Microsoft executives said.  6park.com
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必应搜索中添加的AI聊天机器人一直难以掀起波澜。尽管微软进行了华丽的推广，但它并未对谷歌(Google)的搜索市场份额造成多大影响。高管们曾预计，如果必应赶超谷歌，可能会带来数十亿美元的新收入，但将近一年过去了，必应增加的市场份额还不到一个百分点。 6park.com
The AI-powered chatbot added to Bing search has struggled to make waves. Despite a flashy rollout from Microsoft, it didn’t make much of a dent in Google’s search market share. Executives had expected potentially billions in new revenue if Bing gained on Google, and nearly a year later, Bing has gained less than 1 percentage point of market share. 6park.com
    
一些公司对采用AI技术犹豫不决。波士顿咨询公司(Boston Consulting Group)的一项调查显示，尽管近90%的企业高管表示，生成式AI是他们公司今年的首要任务，但近三分之二的高管表示，这项技术至少需要两年时间才能有超过炒作水平的真材实料。其中约70%的人只关注小规模和有限的测试。 6park.com
Some companies are hesitant to dive into adopting AI technology. A survey from Boston Consulting Group showed that while nearly 90% of business executives said generative AI was a top priority for their companies this year, nearly two-thirds said it would take at least two years for the technology to move beyond hype. About 70% of them were focused only on small-scale and limited tests. 6park.com
    
微软一直押注公司出于使用AI的愿望，会愿意签订大规模合同。去年11月微软AI助手大范围开放时，企业用户必须承诺至少有300名用户。微软的一位软件经销商说，许多公司都不愿意为未经验证的软件做出如此大的承诺。 6park.com
Microsoft had been betting that the desire to use the AI would persuade companies to sign up for massive contracts. When it made the assistant widely available in November, companies had to sign up for at least 300 subscriptions. Many were resistant to that size of commitment for unproven software, said a Microsoft software reseller. 


微软表示，它相信通过该工具节省的时间和金钱是值得的。

上个月，微软放宽了最低要求，允许企业以更小的规模试用该软件。 6park.com
Last month, Microsoft eased its minimum requirement, allowing businesses to pilot the software with much smaller groups. 6park.com
    
微软表示，相信通过该工具节省的时间和金钱是物有所值的。 6park.com
Microsoft says it is confident the time and money saved through the tool are worth the cost.  6park.com
    
去年11月，微软对该软件的早期测试者进行的调查发现，77% 的测试者不想放弃该软件，因为它能节省工作人员的时间。将它应用于会议摘要可让人们一次会议节省大约30分钟时间。微软表示，AI辅助写作让用户的初稿写作时间节省六分钟。 6park.com
In November, Microsoft’s survey of early testers of the software found that 77% of them didn’t want to give it up because it saves workers’ time. Meeting summaries saved people about 30 minutes a meeting. Artificial-intelligence-assisted writing saved users six minutes on writing first drafts, Microsoft said. 6park.com
     
材料科学公司陶氏化学(Dow)首席信息官兼首席数字官Melanie Kalmar表示，经过大约300人的测试阶段后， 陶氏化学计划到2024年底向大约一半的员工推广Copilot。 6park.com
Materials-science company Dow plans to roll out Copilot to approximately half of its employees by the end of 2024, after a test phase with about 300 people, according to Melanie Kalmar, chief information and chief digital officer at Dow.  6park.com
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Kalmar称：“效率提高了非常多。”该公司总部位于密歇根州米德兰市，拥有约35,900名员工。 6park.com
“There have been tremendous efficiency gains,” Kalmar said. The company, based in Midland, Mich., has approximately 35,900 employees.  6park.com
     
接受《华尔街日报》(The Wall Street Journal)采访的早期测试者表示，微软工作场所通讯软件Teams的AI插件最有用。 6park.com
Early testers who spoke with The Wall Street Journal said the AI add-ons for Microsoft’s workplace communication software Teams were most useful. 6park.com
    
一些人已经开始依赖Copilot在他们开会迟到时获得会议内容摘要。现在，身处不同国家和时区的人可以选择不参加会议，只阅读摘要。 6park.com
Some had already become reliant on Copilot if they were late to a meeting, to get a summary of what had been said. Those in different countries and time zones now have the option to skip meetings and just read summaries. 6park.com
    
联想集团(Lenovo)全球首席信息官Art Hu说：“它已经让人们可以说，‘你知道吗，已经有另外10个人在参加这次电话会议了。我不会参加这次会议了。我会在早上阅读此次会议的摘要， 并跳到此次会议上我真正需要听的那部分内容，来了解这些信息。’” 6park.com
“It has allowed people to say, ‘You know what, there is already 10 other people on the call. I’m going to skip this one. I’m going to catch up in the morning by reading the digest and skipping to the parts of the meeting I really needed to hear,’” said Art Hu, the global chief information officer at Lenovo.  6park.com
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在其他方面，测试人员说这项技术有不足之处：包括其他生成式AI工具在内的微软365的Copilot有时会产生幻觉，感觉这个功能杜撰了一些应答。用户说，Copilot有时会在会议总结上出错。 6park.com
In other areas, testers say the tech has fallen short: Copilot for Microsoft 365, including other generative AI tools, sometimes hallucinated, meaning it fabricated responses. Users said Copilot, at times, would make mistakes on meeting summaries.  6park.com
    
在一家广告公司，Copilot生成的会议摘要曾说 "Bob"谈到了“产品战略”。 6park.com
At one ad agency, a Copilot-generated summary of a meeting once said that “Bob” spoke about “product strategy.” 6park.com
    
该公司的一位高管说，问题是没有一个叫Bob的人参加了那次电话会议上，也没有人谈到产品战略。 6park.com
The problem was that no one named Bob was on the call and no one spoke about product strategy, an executive at the company said.  6park.com
   
在另一些程序中，尤其是处理数字的程序，幻觉的问题更大。测试人员说，他们使用某些AI助手的可能性较小，Excel是其中之一，因为要求该程序计算数字有时会出错。 6park.com
In other programs—particularly the ones that handle numbers—hallucinations are more problematic. Testers said Excel was one of the programs on which they were less likely to use the AI assistant because asking it to crunch numbers sometimes generated mistakes.  6park.com
    
微软公司负责工作场所应用的副总裁Jared Spataro表示，Excel还处于预览阶段，在实用性方面落后于其他程序。 6park.com
Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of workplace applications, said that Excel was still in preview and lagged behind the other programs in usefulness. 6park.com
    
一些用户表示，微软所宣传的其他功能也令人失望，包括Copilot生成PowerPoint幻灯片的功能。 6park.com
Other features that Microsoft has touted, including the ability for Copilot to generate PowerPoint slides, have also been disappointing, some users said. 6park.com
    
投资公司Andreessen Horowitz的合伙人Guido Appenzeller在X上发布了一个跟帖，展示了它在被提示做一个演示时所犯的错误。 6park.com
Guido Appenzeller, a partner at investment firm Andreessen Horowitz, posted a thread on X showing the mistakes it makes when prompted to make a presentation. 6park.com
    
Appenzeller说：“简直是一团糟，根本无法实现增值。” 6park.com
“It is a mess and not anywhere close to adding value,” Appenzeller said. 6park.com
    
宾夕法尼亚大学沃顿商学院(University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School)研究AI的教授Ethan Mollick在一篇文章中指出，在Outlook中，Copilot为可能召开的会议推荐的时间是已预订的时间或是周六。 6park.com
Ethan Mollick, a professor of AI at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, noted in a post that in Outlook, Copilot suggested times for a potential meeting that were booked or on Saturdays. 6park.com
    
Mollick还是对该软件给予了积极评估，称其为“十分优秀的工具”。 6park.com
Mollick otherwise gave the software a positive review, calling it a “pretty impressive set of tools.” 6park.com
    
微软的施洋表示，PowerPoint“仍在摸索之中”。 6park.com
Microsoft’s Spataro said PowerPoint is “still learning its way.” 6park.com
    
一些早期采用者表示，对AI工具最初的兴奋感很快就消退了。联想表示，除了用于在Teams上转录会议的AI之外，一个月后大多数软件的Copilot使用下降了约20%。 6park.com
Some early adopters said the initial excitement about the AI tools wore off quickly. Lenovo said that aside from the AI used to transcribe meetings on Teams, there was about a 20% drop in the use of Copilot for most software after a month. 6park.com
   
微软的施洋说，公司计划通过加入更多的警示和提示来提醒用户，以解决用户流失问题。 6park.com
Microsoft’s Spataro said the company plans to address the drop-off issue by incorporating more alerts and tips to nudge users.