Microsoft is appealing to our technological nostalgia with a Clippy sticker pack for Teams.
Boomers should immediately recognize the sentient paper clip. Zoomers: Clippy was essentially a predecessor to virtual assistants like Alexa or Siri that was theoretically supposed to help Office users navigate the increasingly complex software. In practice, however, Clippy was mostly a distraction that was actively detrimental to productivity more often than it was helpful.
But nothing brings people together like shared trauma, which is why so many long-time Office users have a certain amount of nostalgia for the smarmy paper clip. Enter this new sticker pack for Teams, which The Verge says is a follow-up to an employee-created pack that Microsoft’s so-called “brand police” nixed in 2019, likely because they didn’t want Teams to seem dated.
Apparently the company got over it. “Yes, it’s true – Clippy has agreed to come out of retirement!” it said on the Teams feedback portal. “Whether you loved him or hated him, Clippy is back with a Retro Sticker Pack in Teams.” The post also linked to Microsoft’s announcement of a Clippy-themed background that debuted alongside homages to Solitaire and Paint in July.
Now the question is whether or not Clippy will be content to remain a meme. If so, Microsoft’s continued efforts to promote Teams by playing on people’s nostalgia seem harmless. If not, well, we all survived the aggressive office assistant before. We should be able to do it again.
