It sure looks like Microsoft is bringing back Clippy… as an emoji

Whoever is in charge of Microsoft’s Twitter account decided to tempt fate today.

“If this gets 20k likes, we’ll replace the paperclip emoji in Microsoft 365 with Clippy,” the account tweeted. At the time of writing, said tweet has 117K likes.

If this gets 20k likes, we’ll replace the paperclip emoji in Microsoft 365 with Clippy. pic.twitter.com/6T8ziboguC

— Microsoft (@Microsoft) July 14, 2021

It looks like it’s time for Clippy’s great comeback.

Before there was Cortana, Siri, Alexa, or the Google Assistant… there was Clippy. Formally known (by no one) as Clippit, Clippy was simply ahead of its time, the misunderstood assistant in Office versions of yore. It was just trying its darndest to help you get those documents written.

While being relegated to a simple emoji is a fall from grace from being a quasi-sentient animated assistant, I get the feeling many might find Clippy a bit more to their liking with less… interaction.

Of course, this is all assuming the folks at Microsoft stay true to their word — but I’m gonna hold them to it.