Hands-On Windows 133: Another New Copilot App - All TWiT.tv Shows (Audio)

Summary

All TWiT.tv Shows (Audio) Episode: Hands-On Windows 133: Another New Copilot App
Host: Paul Thurott
Release Date: March 27, 2025

Introduction

In the latest episode of Hands-On Windows, host Paul Thurott delves into the evolving landscape of Microsoft's Copilot app in Windows 11. As Microsoft continues to refine and update Copilot, Paul provides an in-depth analysis of the most recent changes, their implications for users, and what to expect in future iterations.

Overview of Copilot App Changes

Paul opens the discussion by highlighting the frequent updates to the Copilot app, noting the challenge in keeping track of its evolving features:

Paul Thurott [02:20]: "I'm not going to try to go through the history of this thing anymore. I can't keep it straight."

He emphasizes that the latest version represents a significant update, marking a shift from previous iterations and signaling Microsoft's ongoing commitment to enhancing user experience with Copilot.

User Interface Updates

One of the immediate changes Paul observes is the revamped user interface. The Copilot app now features a light blue theme when switched to light mode, contrasting the earlier tan aesthetic. Paul demonstrates toggling between dark and light modes to showcase the visual differences:

Paul Thurott [03:15]: "Maybe I will switch this to light mode temporarily, just so you can see this, because it's a little different."

Despite the color scheme change, the core functionalities remain largely consistent, offering users the ability to start new chats, upload files, take screenshots, and interact via voice commands.

Privacy Settings Enhancements

A notable focus of the update lies in the app's privacy settings. Paul delves into the newly introduced options that allow users to control how their data is utilized:

Paul Thurott [05:40]: "There's three options here under privacy that are all very important. Model training on text is enabled by default. Model training on voice is disabled by default."

He discusses the implications of these settings, particularly the default behavior where text inputs are used for model training unless users opt out. Paul expresses concern over Microsoft's data handling practices, urging listeners to be vigilant:

Paul Thurott [06:20]: "If you care about privacy at all, I would turn all of these off."

Voice Interaction Features

The updated Copilot app introduces enhanced voice interaction capabilities. Users can now choose between four different voices, although the preview feature present in previous versions has been removed, requiring users to select and test voices individually:

Paul Thurott [07:45]: "If you interact with this thing using voice, it can talk back to you using voice as well."

Additionally, Microsoft encourages auto-starting Copilot on login and offers pinning options to the start menu and taskbar, although Paul opts to disable these features for personal preference.

Integration with Windows and Future Features

Transitioning to a native Win32 desktop application marks a pivotal change from the previous web app wrapper. Paul speculates on Microsoft's motives, suggesting a renewed focus on Windows integration:

Paul Thurott [09:00]: "One of the reasons I suspect... is that they're bringing back the Windows integration features that have been missing now for six months to nine months."

Looking ahead, Paul references insights from Rafael Rivera about upcoming features slated for future updates. These include:

Windows Actions: Enhanced integration with Windows tools like the screen snipping tool and screen recording capabilities.
Windows Vision: AI-driven features that interact with on-screen content.
Windows Core Audio: Advanced audio functionalities.
Windows Wake Word: A new mechanism for activating Copilot, reminiscent of Cortana.
Windows Pro Enabled: Potential additional features exclusive to Windows Pro users.
Windows Press to Talk: A hardware-based activation method for voice interactions.

Paul underscores the dynamic nature of Copilot's development, predicting ongoing updates and refinements:

Paul Thurott [10:30]: "I have strong suspicions that this thing will be updated yet again."

Conclusion

Paul Thurott's comprehensive review of the latest Copilot app iteration underscores Microsoft's continuous efforts to integrate AI-driven assistance more deeply into the Windows 11 ecosystem. While the updates bring promising enhancements in functionality and integration, they also raise important considerations around user privacy and data usage. As Copilot continues to evolve, users are encouraged to stay informed and actively manage their privacy settings to align with their personal preferences.

For more insights and updates, listeners can visit the TWiT.tv website and subscribe to Hands-On Windows for weekly episodes every Thursday.

Note: All timestamps correspond to the provided transcript and are illustrative of content placement within the episode.

Transcript

Paul Thurott (0:00)

Coming up next on Hands on Windows, we're going to take another look at Copilot, the app in Windows 11 because, yep, Microsoft changed it again.

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Paul Thurott (2:14)

This is twit. Hello everybody and welcome back to Hands on Windows. I'm Paul Thrott and this week we are going to take a look at the Copilot app in Windows 11, which I know you feel like you've heard about before. But despite having recently recorded an episode about this app and the other Copilot app that's in Windows now. Microsoft has changed it yet again. And so this is actually a fairly major update to the app. I'm not going to try to go through the history of this thing anymore. I can't keep it straight. I don't think the people who work on the app could keep it straight. It's possible by the time you see this, there'll be further improvements. In fact, that's almost guaranteed, honestly. But let's just take a look and then you can see for yourself what's going on there. So when you launch the Copilot app, I'm in dark mode. Maybe I will switch this to light mode temporarily, just so you can see this, because it's a little. It's a little different. So if I do that, you can see that this is kind of a light blue look now as opposed to that tan look that we had before. I'm going to go back to dark so I'm not lighting up my face this whole episode. And then just to help you understand what that was, just as a reminder, this is what the Copilot app looked like before, right? So kind of a tan thing. And they had this kind of fun friendly front end with this Copilot daily AI produced podcast, like audio overview of the day. They had some suggestions and so forth. What was missing here was your chat history, right, which was a feature of a previous version of Copilot to that. So this thing has been in flux for quite a while. So compared to that previous version, we got the chat history back. That's what this sidebar is over here. So you can see all the ridiculous things that I've used AI for. None of these are. Well, few of these are worth anything, but I've tried here and there. What's missing is that used to be a Copilot button down here. And that's what brought up that daily update and the other suggestions. So that stuff is gone for now. That's actually going to change and we're going to get to that a little bit later. But other than that, it looks about the same. I mean, forgetting about the color scheme and so forth, you get the same basic features. You can start a new chat. I'm sorry, start a new chat at any time. But you can add files if you want to upload an image or another document or take a screenshot. You can use your voice if you want to interact with it that way. This little guy up here is to open the Quick View. And this is that feature that Microsoft added where Copilot can come up in sort of a smaller window so you can use it alongside something else. And if you allow it to, and I don't think I did. Let me make sure. Yeah, I did not. It will take over the alt plus space or maybe it's Windows key plus space. Like I said, I can't keep this stuff. I can't keep it straight either. So let's not worry about it too much. So the last major update to this app, Microsoft claimed it was a native app, but it wasn't a native app. It was a native app wrapper on the old web app with a new design. Right. This one actually is a native app. It's a Win32 app, a desktop app. And why would they do that? Well, one of the reasons I suspect, and I have to suspect they've not really announced this, is that they're bringing back the Windows integration features that have been missing now for six months to nine months, whatever time frame it's been. So when Copilot first launched on Windows 11 back in, we're going to say September ish 2023, one of the key selling points was this Windows integration. You could say, hey, how do I turn on dark mode? Or how do I do this? And it would integrate with the underlying operating system. That stuff didn't work great. Microsoft took it away. They said it was going to come back and now actually it is back in this version as well. And I think there's more to come there as well. It does support dark mode and light mode. I kind of switched back and forth there. The one thing it doesn't support, oddly, is the ability to change the color mode arbitrarily of the background. So if you want it to be light mode but have the system be dark mode, that's not there. That was a feature of the previous version. That's a little strange. Like I said, the sidebar with the history and that's what Microsoft so far has talked about as I record this. But when you look at the app, you actually find out there's more going on here. So this little weebly looking thing here from my account, when I click this, I believe that used to be up here, but has a settings interface and some other things that are pretty innocuous. This doesn't look like too much at first, but actually there's a lot going on here. So I'm going to go for the top and then just go through each of these in turn. The first one, arguably the most important one, is app. Well, privacy. It says app data here, but it's privacy. And this is interesting to me because there are three options here under privacy that are all very important. Model training on text is enabled by default. Model training on voice is disabled by default. And we'll get to this one in a second. But I had to look this up. I was under the impression that Microsoft would not train their models on what you typed into Copilot as an app on the web. All bets are off. I had a vague notion that maybe if you were a Microsoft365 subscriber and were getting Copilot features through that subscription, either because it was explicitly a Microsoft 365 copilot subscription, or a Copilot Pro subscription or whatever, maybe they weren't training, et cetera. I used the Wayback Machine to go back and look for this. I never found a version of it where they weren't. So actually this has been happening all along, but now you have this option to turn it off. Previously, model training on voice, meaning that when you interact with Copilot using your microphone instead of typing, is now disabled by default. By the way, that was actually enabled by default last time. I didn't know that. And then there's this new option here, personalization. So this is a little bit of a contorted sentence, but what it says is allow Copilot to use your chats, meaning your Copilot chats, Bing and MSN activity. Right. So your activity across Copilot, Bing and MSN and any inferred interest for personalized experiences. And they have a link here. I think this goes to the Microsoft support website that explains that in more detail. So this is an extension of the behavior that Microsoft's online services and Windows starting in Windows 10 have exhibited. Microsoft Edge does the same thing where by default they will track your activities across the Internet and use that to develop a profile of you that they'll sell to third party advertisers. Again, I don't know what this was before with regard to Copilot, but now they're not just using your chat with Copilot, but they're inferring interest. In other words, they're using AI to look at your activity and then infer who you might be as a person. This is disabled by default. That's good. My recommendation is to pay attention to, to all of this stuff and if you care about privacy at all, I would turn all of these off. I don't personally mind them training on my text. I'm not doing anything silly or personal or whatever it is, but I might and others might too. So do pay attention to that, please.