Last week, Copilot made an unsolicited appearance in Microsoft 365. This week, Apple turned on Apple Intelligence by default in its upcoming operating system releases. And it isn’t easy to get through any of Google’s services without stumbling over Gemini.
Regulators worldwide are keen to ensure that marketing and similar services are opt-in. When dark patterns are used to steer users in one direction or another, lawmakers pay close attention.
But, for some reason, forcing AI on customers is acceptable. Rather than asking “we’re going to shovel a load of AI services into your apps that you never asked for, but our investors really need you to use, is this OK?” the assumption instead is that users will be delighted to see their formerly pristine applications cluttered with AI features.
Customers have not asked for any of this. There has been no clamoring for search summaries, no pent-up demand for the revival of a jumped-up Clippy. There is no desire to wreak further havoc on the environment to get an almost-correct recipe for tomato soup. And yet here we are, ready or not.
Without a choice to opt in, the beatings will continue until AI adoption improves or users find that pesky opt-out option.
Because very few people are ever going to turn an optional feature on, whether they would ultimately like it or not. They need to be shown it. If they hate it, they will turn it off.
They can be offered to choose.
Opt-out is always bad because it is meant to exploit users who are not aware that a certain feature can be turned off. Even among those who do, not all are confidently going through settings.