this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2025
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YSK: People are switching their profile pictures to Microsoft's Clippy in protest of the unethical, immoral, anti-consumer practices by various companies. The movement was started by Louis Rossmann (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_Dtmpe9qaQ) on August 7th, 2025.

@6:46 "Clippy's a symbol that what used to be considered one of the worst annoyances in our life would now not only be welcomed, but for all of his flaws, celebrated as an idol. Because for all of these things that occur right now where there is negative malice of intent, [...] Clippy just wanted to help. And if you were to turn him on today, unlike most cloud bullshit, he'd still work."

Louis hopes for this to be a show of solidarity.

@5:44 "When a company CEO logs into their Slack and sees 10,000 Clippy's looking back at them, what I hope occurs is that they intuitively understand that they no longer live in a world where they can get away with fucking over the consumer."

@5:58 "[...] that [people] are alert and they are aware of what is going on, and they are going to politely but firmly push back against it. Every single one of those 10,000 people will be an obstacle to the anti-consumer practices and the anti-ownership practices, and they will no longer be another cog in the assembly line sending us all into a dystopia."

Why YSK: I was curious about the number of Clippy avatars, and thought other people might be curious too.

@4:28 "Clippy never tried to normalize sex trafficking. He just wanted to help."

(page 2) 50 comments
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[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 40 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

Were these people too young in the early 2000s to recognize Clippy for what it was? It was never benign—ChatGPT is exactly what Microsoft always wanted to make, but Clippy was as close as it could get at the time. They are part and parcel of the same thing.

This is like protesting Trump with pictures of George W. Bush.

[–] y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com 18 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] GeeDubHayduke@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] MegaUltraChicken@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The thought "well honesty Alberto Gonzalez as AG is like 10 steps up right now..." popped into my head and now I'm sad.

Never thought Donald Rumsfeld would be a step up from Whiskey Gate, but here we are.

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[–] TommySoda@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago (4 children)

If you could explain how you got to that conclusion I would love to know. Not trying to be rude, just interested in where it's coming from.

[–] chiliedogg@lemmy.world 23 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Clippy (actual name Clippit), was an avatar for the Office Assistant User Interface introduced in Office 97. It read the contents of your documents and would pop up and give you advice, and was basically an attempt at an intelligent agent, but 30 years ago.

It wasn't nearly as sophisticated and invasive as the current bullshit, but that's largely because the tech to be as sophisticated and invasive as the current bullshit didn't exist in 1997.

[–] vivi@slrpnk.net 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

He also says in the video that clippy didn't read your letter. It did--that's how it could detect that you were writing one.

[–] Deconceptualist@leminal.space 13 points 1 day ago

Exactly. That was captured in one of Clippy's most famous lines.

"I see you're trying to write a letter. Can I help?"

"I see you're trying to write a résumé. Can I help?"

This of course got parodied a million times:

"I see you're trying to write a radical manifesto. Can I help?"

"I see you're trying to write a suicide note. Can I help?"

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[–] Zachariah@lemmy.world 22 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] yyyesss@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Can I teach you a lesson?

I'm gonna wear your skin!

[–] vivalapivo@lemmy.today 3 points 1 day ago

I'm gonna wear your skin!

You haven't thought of the smell, you bitch

[–] wuffah@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago (8 children)

Predatory software has become so bad that now we have to use the previous generation’s intrusive hated features to protest the new ones.

Here’s my protest profile pic.

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[–] defaultusername@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Fuck Clippy. Clippy represents Microsoft's monopolistic practices in the office suite space by using proprietary formats and making sure ODF was less supported.

We should have a different character that annoyingly explains things instead, like Navi, Kaepora Gaebora, or Omochao.

[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 day ago

Navi, Kaepora Gaebora, or Omochao.

What you said but for Nintendo and Sega

[–] A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

I'm sure this will work just as well as changing out avatars to green helped overthrow the iranian theocracy.

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