Last year, the editors of Merriam-Webster’s dictionary anointed their word of the year as “slop,” a term denoting the low-quality flood of AI output that’s been jamming up feeds for years now.
The latest victim? Software giant Microsoft. After infuriating vast swathes of its user base with an unrelenting barrage of AI-enhanced features — even declaring its latest Windows 11 operating system as an “agentic OS” — the company has garnered a reputation for doubling down on the tech with little regard for whether it’s actually benefiting customers.
The ensuing blunders have represented a massive hit for Microsoft’s brand, ranging from maddeningly ineffective search tools to intrusive chatbots and bugs that leaked confidential emails. To sum it all up, netizens came up with a pejorative term: “Microslop,” which clearly infuriated executives at the company.
In the latest sign that it’s getting under Microsoft’s skin, the company banned the phrase on its over-one-year-old Discord server dedicated to the company’s Copilot chatbot, as Windows Latest discovered.
Things spiraled from there. After users found simple workarounds for the new rule, like spelling it “Microsl0p,” the company’s moderation team locked the entire Discord server and hid its messaging history.
It’s yet another embarrassing failure to read the room, underlining how little goodwill Microsoft has left as it attempts to shoehorn AI into most of its offerings. Even its text-editing software, Notepad, got an AI makeover recently, opening up a major cybersecurity vulnerability in the process.
Worse yet, Microsoft’s decision to shut down the Discord server is bringing more attention to the growing backlash.
“Streisand effect in full swing,” one Reddit user argued, referring to the phenomenon where attempts to suppress information backfire. (The effect’s name was inspired by Barbra Streisand suing a photographer for violating her privacy by taking a photo of her cliff-top residence in Malibu to document coastal erosion, ultimately bringing major media attention to the issue instead of suppressing it.)
“The only thing more effective at spreading a meme than trying to ban it is… trying to ban it,” another user argued. “Microsoft just ensured ‘Microslop’ will be the default term for the next decade. Well played.”
In short, public sentiment for Microsoft’s AI offerings is seemingly at an all-time low. That’s despite the company’s capital expenditures soaring as it pours tens of billions of dollars into AI computing chips — a risky bet that’s failing to impress investors.
Customers are also not exactly keen on the company’s latest obsession.
“Microslop ain’t gonna stop me to continue calling it Microslop,” one Reddit user wrote.
More on Microslop: “Microslop”: Infuriating Video Sums Up How Microsoft Is Ruining Windows With AI