Donna,

Definitely weird and concerning!

I would agree with you, that Meta AI is probably not a good idea, is probably invasive, and may be even more problematic down the road a bit.

As to Microsoft, they may very well be working towards similar nefarious goals.

But, as has often happened with their software over 40 years, they either let errors and bugs go unchecked, or they do not fully think through many user-interface designs or changes.

So, in their case, it can more often be a bug, rather than a design feature.

Okay, I may be little biased (no scratch that, quite biased), as I had been part of a team of Mac developers since the release of the color-graphic Mac II.

We also, had to develop some, then on DOS, later on windows.

But we were required to use Microsoft products on all the non Apple pcs.

(Excel started out well, as it was initially developed for the Mac interface, before Microsoft came out with Windows).

Our team was a group of engineers, who would oversee the completion and startup of our company's processes, in various locations & countries.

Between startups, we would work on developing realtime simulations of those refinery & chemical plant processes.

Before the Mac II, we developed on the color-graphic 8086 NEC, using the p-System, where the CPM hosted p-System was far, far easier to program with, than the DOS hosted p-System.

Interesting that for the Apple II, they used the p-System.

Also, the CPM hosted p-System's BIOS was easier to modify in assembler, than was the DOS, I think, because one of the UCSD students, who developed the p-System, wrote the CPM BIOS.

With the introduction of the GUI Mac, and its super, super easier programming interfaces, we wanted to go that way, but still needed color, so we had to wait for the Mac II.

It really was simpler to program on the Mac, so when Microsoft finally jumped from DOS to Windows, it even more obvious.

Windows was many, many times more difficult to program for our software, than the Mac was, and it continued to be that way for a long time.

So, with my bias, speculated that Microsoft, although they may be attempting to master the nefarious, they are not even pulling that off too well, either.

However, since moved on to operator training, and later to laboratory systems, over the past 20 years, so only now program, some, using VBA Excel to interface between 90's GCs and Windows.

Yes, geek-city  -  but pretty far in the past, so if you ask for any software help, sorry  -  reboot is about the only recommendation anymore  -  bummer.

.