The Mojo Question Returns
Microsoft has spent the past three years positioning itself as the undisputed leader in enterprise AI, pouring billions into OpenAI, integrating Copilot into every product surface, and rebranding Azure as the cloud for AI workloads. But a new WIRED investigation published June 5, 2026, suggests the company’s momentum is faltering. According to the report, Microsoft’s AI products “aren’t selling,” and GitHub—once the crown jewel of its developer ecosystem—has been “plagued with troubles.” In an interview with WIRED, VP Scott Hanselman was asked directly whether Microsoft is in catch-up mode, a question that resonates with a decades-old pattern of missed opportunities.
The article, penned by veteran tech journalist Steven Levy, revisits a theme that has haunted Redmond since the early 2000s: the cycle of dominance followed by complacency, followed by a frantic scramble to reclaim relevance. With AI now the defining technology of the decade, the stakes are higher than ever. For developers and enterprise customers who have bet heavily on Microsoft’s AI stack, the signals are worrying.
Copilot’s Cold Shoulder
Microsoft’s flagship AI product, Copilot for Microsoft 365, launched with great fanfare in late 2023. Priced at $30 per user per month on top of existing subscriptions, it promised to revolutionize productivity by generating documents, summarizing meetings, and drafting emails. Yet adoption has reportedly fallen short of internal forecasts. WIRED cites multiple sources indicating that enterprise customers are hesitant to pay the premium, especially after early testing revealed inconsistencies in accuracy and security concerns around data handling. One IT administrator quoted in the article described the product as “a nice demo, not a must-have.”
The challenge is not unique to Microsoft—other AI copilot tools have faced similar pushback—but for a company that invested over $13 billion in OpenAI and repositioned its entire go-to-market around AI, the slow uptake is a red flag. Competing products from Google (Gemini for Workspace) and Salesforce (Einstein GPT) are also struggling to convert hype into revenue, but Microsoft’s market position makes its struggles more conspicuous.
Meanwhile, GitHub Copilot, the code-generation tool that launched in 2021 and quickly became the most popular AI developer assistant, is facing its own headwinds. According to the WIRED report, GitHub has been “plagued with troubles,” a phrase that likely refers to a combination of quality issues, legal challenges, and developer backlash. In early 2026, GitHub faced a class-action lawsuit over the use of open-source code to train its models without proper attribution. Additionally, several high-profile developers publicly criticized the tool for generating buggy or insecure code that required more time to fix than to write from scratch.
Hanselman’s Honesty
Scott Hanselman, a longtime developer advocate and now Vice President of Developer Community at Microsoft, did not shy away from the criticism in his interview with WIRED. “We see the feedback,” he said. “We know we’re not perfect. The question is whether we have the humility and the speed to fix our mistakes before the next wave passes us by.” Hanselman acknowledged that Microsoft’s AI efforts are “still in the early innings,” but admitted that the company has a tendency to overpromise and underdeliver when it comes to new technologies.
He pointed to GitHub’s ongoing efforts to improve code review accuracy and add better guardrails for security-sensitive projects. However, he stopped short of announcing any major product pivots or timeline changes. For developers watching the space, Hanselman’s candor is refreshing but also concerning—it suggests that Microsoft’s leadership is aware of the problems but has not yet found a clear path to solving them.
The interview also touched on Azure AI services, which compete directly with Amazon Bedrock and Google Vertex AI. While Azure remains the second-largest cloud provider, its AI-specific growth has slowed compared to rivals. Enterprises report that while Azure’s model catalog is extensive, the developer experience and tooling lag behind. “The documentation is still not where it needs to be,” one senior cloud architect told WIRED. “We’re seeing teams choose AWS just because the SDKs are cleaner.”
A Familiar Pattern
Microsoft has been here before. In the 1990s and early 2000s, it dominated desktop computing only to miss the internet wave—then recovered spectacularly with .NET and later Azure. It missed mobile entirely, scraping together a minor presence with Windows Phone before abandoning it. It fumbled social media, search, and hardware before finding its footing again under Satya Nadella. The AI wave is different because Microsoft was an early mover, thanks largely to its partnership with OpenAI. Yet the company now appears to be repeating the cycle: first-mover advantage squandered by execution slip-ups.
The comparison to the open-source software movement is apt. Microsoft once fought open source tooth and nail, only to later embrace it under Nadella. Similarly, the company has oscillated between embracing and alienating its developer community. GitHub’s acquisition in 2018 was celebrated, but the subsequent integration of Copilot and changes to pricing have caused friction. The company’s decision to monetize AI aggressively before the technology was fully baked risks alienating the very developers it relies on to advocate for its platforms.
What to Watch Next
The next quarter will be critical for Microsoft. Nadella’s earnings call in July 2026 will be closely scrutinized for metrics on Copilot subscriber counts and Azure AI revenue. Any downward guidance could trigger a sell-off in a stock that has already been volatile amid broader AI hype fatigue. More importantly, developers and enterprise buyers will be watching for product improvements, not marketing messages. If Microsoft can deliver a more reliable, secure, and affordable AI experience, it may yet reclaim the narrative. But if the malaise deepens, the “mojo” question will become more than a headline—it will become a strategic liability.
For the AI community, the lesson is clear: being first doesn’t guarantee staying power. Execution, trust, and developer satisfaction are the true moats. Microsoft built them once; now it must prove it can build them again in the age of machine intelligence.
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