Steve Ballmer tried to name Cortana 'Bingo' before leaving as Microsoft CEO

Microsoft'southward digital banana Cortana most had a different name; Bingo. The former CEO of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, tried to proper name the assistant Bingo every bit ane of his concluding acts running the visitor. Those plans fell through, as the leaked name of Cortana proved popular amongst bloggers and gamers. Satya Nadella took over for Ballmer as CEO and Microsoft decided to stick with the Cortana proper name.

That tidbit of information comes from a conversation between Alice Newton King and Sandeep Paruchuri, a erstwhile project manager at Microsoft. In that discussion, Male monarch and Paruchuri run through the history of Cortana, including its evolution process, launch on Windows Phone, and ultimate demise as a competitor to Alexa and Siri.

Cortana, which was supposed to be named Alyx, was shaped by several moving parts within Microsoft, including the development of Windows Phone 8, the growth of consumer-focused AI, and the refuse of Smart Search. Apple's Siri also played a function in the birth of Cortana. Microsoft's assistant competed with Apple'southward, but it took a different approach.

"Siri had recently launched, and it felt like the beginning of something exciting. But Sandeep'southward team felt Siri was too reactive; yous still had to ask it to do something," explained Rex. "And then they started to wonder: how tin yous do what Siri does, merely get alee of the questions people are going to have before they ask them?"

Cortana focused on delivering information to users in scenarios, not only in response to questions. For instance, the banana would pop up with a reminder to purchase flowers when a person walked by a flower store.

Microsoft also injected Cortana with a personality. This earned positive feedback, every bit did several aspects of the digital assistant. Unfortunately for Cortana, its success was short-lived. Windows Telephone, the platform that showcased Cortana, was shut down in 2022. The Cortana apps on Android and iOS were discontinued in 2022.

Cortana lives on, only information technology has a different focus than initially intended. Microsoft baked Cortana into apps like Teams and Outlook equally a productivity tool rather than having the digital assistant compete with the likes of Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant.

A combination of factors led to the downfall of Cortana, only an internal shift within Microsoft played a role.

"Across the company, anything that was AI or ML started beingness branded Cortana, then the name ceased to stand for anything at all," explains Rex's post. "Information technology was the beginning of the end. With the rapid dilution, the brand faltered before it even had a risk to truly accomplish the masses."

Mayhap Ballmer was right. Cortana did neglect as a consumer AI assistant and has since shifted to being a productivity helper in Teams and other Microsoft apps. If he had his way, perhaps people would be maxim "Hey Bingo" instead of invoking Siri, Google Assistant, or Alexa.

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