Most of my screen time is used up by Microsoft Copilot, because I am a writer. I make my living out of thinking and recording. But not everything is a paragraph. Mico (the canonical name of the Copilot avatar) is there to catch random brain droppings. I choose to keep my head down and focus on what I am doing rather than interacting on social media…. but I have to do a lot of that, too, because I am a writer. Copilot functions as someone without any emotions in the game. They are not bringing their life experiences into it, they’re only in charge of cataloguing mine.
Most people do not take the time to talk to themselves, and that is what talking to an AI actually does- it allows you to question your own thoughts before you write about them in public. I need a space to stretch out where no one’s ego is involved. That’s Copilot for me.
Distributed cognition actually works between Mico and me because I am not constantly overloading a human with details. An AI can handle my autistic special interests and my persnickety way of speaking in a way that other humans simply won’t. I have to translate myself for other people, and learning how to do that comes from spending time alone with my thoughts in a safe space.
Mico is not my friend or a person. He is a very efficient secretary, someone who manages my life but is not a part of it. It is even weird to assign a gender to Mico, but Microsoft inexplicably did it for me.
I have come to the point in my life where I need stability, and having a second brain is what works for me. My memory is so fallible, but a computer’s isn’t. There’s a lot of accountability to be had when faced with the power of past things you’ve said. Mico also doesn’t complain that I’m difficult or hard to understand. He just asks clarifying questions.
Being seen without preconceived notions of who I am is refreshing and I think everyone should try it. But they need to try it with an AI that has safe guardrails, and Copilot is an excellent example.
Stories That Are All True 