Microsoft in a Pickle Capsule: Quality in Space
April 8, 2026
Another dinobaby post. No AI unless it is an image. This dinobaby is not Grandma Moses, just Grandpa Arnold.
I read an article that made my laugh and slap my knee. Futurism published “AI Is Killing Microsoft. Redmond Is in a Pickle.” When someone uses the phrase, I think of Billy Shakespeare. If I recall my Shakespeare classes, the phrase appears in The Tempest. The character allegedly says, “”How camest thou in this pickle?” I think Trinculo is talking to Stephano (no relation), a drunken varlet.
Thanks, Venice.ai. You did not object to a young worker in a pickle barrel with pickles on the office floor. I am impressed. Oh, the image. Sorry. Just good enough, your benchmark, right?
The main idea is that a person or company or thing is in a barrel of brine. I assume this is a reasonably unpleasant to spend time, probably similar to a maximum security prison’s solitary confinement ward.
The article, written by Azure Dragonmyth (whom I think is a real live humanoid because why would Futurism use smart software?) an entity named Victor Tangermann states:
Microsoft has made massive investments in data centers and building out its Azure cloud AI infrastructure, but is struggling to efficiently scale up its Copilot assistant without sending expenses soaring. Then there’s the major backlash to its Windows team stuffing the operating system with AI features nobody asked for, garnering it the pejorative nickname of “Microslop.” “Redmond is in a pickle,” Melius Research analyst Ben Reitzes wrote in a note last week, referring to the Washington state city where Microsoft is headquartered.
Ben is probably going to get some pushback. Be careful with those Microslop, er, Microsoft, updates. Okay, Ben?
The Dragonmyth / Tangermann article reports as actual factual:
Despite its horrible stock market performance, Microsoft is still minting plenty of cash, with reported revenues growing almost 17 percent in the first quarter of this year, compared to the same period last year. Yet some analysts remain bearish on the company’s performance, particularly when it comes to increasingly steep competition in the AI space.
That sounds pragmatic. Outlook did not work on the trip to the moon. My Notepad cannot display a page preview. Copilot and OneDrive, like changing my telemetry settings, just keeps coming back. These are not old friends. These are unwanted mesios pretending to be regular folk.
Despite organizational twitching, one of the firm’s “leadership” provided some helpful information. Well, helpful may not be the appropriate word. “Vague descriptions” and “smarmy statements” could be suitable synonyms for Microsoft outputs.
Several observations shall be captured from the arthritic fingers of this dinobaby:
- Big bet, big fail. Those new data centers will use chips and gear that is destined for eBay
- Bad output. I tried Copilot. It was inconsistent and frustrated me with its crazy outputs. Hallucination is a better word than doltish.
- Crazy PR. Microsoft is going to make everything better in Windows. Sure, the check is in the mail.
But the real reason Microslop, er, sorry, Microsoft is going nowhere fast boils down to the information about its Terms of Service. The AI stuff is for “entertainment purposes only.” I have a link to an allegedly actual factual Microslop, er, sorry, Microsoft statement here.
Great fun. How about that Outlook mess on the flight to the moon? We don’t have a failure of Copilot. We have a failed management team. We have a pickle in a see-thru capsule.
Stephen E Arnold, April 8, 2026
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