Microsoft stops loneliness with AI browsing companion?

After first announcing it in October, Microsoft has launched its Copilot Vision tool to US Copilot Pro subscribers to cure loneliness, it would seem:

“Browsing no longer needs to be a lonely experience with just you and all your tabs.”

Vision is an “AI companion” that sits on the bottom of your Edge browser, and when activated, “sees the page you’re on and reads along with you”. It can then answer questions like “What’s the recipe for this lasagna”, help you shop and find discounted products or specific items for things like holidays, find places to go, give you advice for games like chess and Minecraft, decipher photos, and translate text.  

“It sees the page you’re on, it reads along with you, and you can talk through the problem you’re facing together.”

Pro subscribers can access it via Copilot Labs, Microsoft's testing ground for new AI features, and have been reassured, by Microsoft, that no processed audio, images, or text will be stored or used to train models, all Copilot conversations will be deleted (although the caveat to that is Copilots' responses will be saved to “improve our safety systems), ‘sensitive’ or paywalled content will be avoided—it will only work on websites that Microsoft has tested and approved—and it is very much an ‘opt-in’ feature.