WWDC24is almost here and everyone expect it to be all about AI . As the eyes of the tech humans turn back to Apple , there ’s a good deal of work to do . It ’s got to set up that it ’s been working on AI features for age , show off novel features , arrest up with AI feature article from competitors , and maybe even take the chance to show where it ’s raising the bar .
But this is n’t just Apple ’s chance to show it ’s doing AI right field . It ’s also an chance to redefine the conversation about AI to make it more substantive and outcome - orient – and , of course , to make Apple look better while doing it .
Adult in the room
Let ’s face it – for all its hope , the last few years of AI have also been kind of a disaster . racialism , preconception , more bias cause by anti - bias training , recommendations toeat rocksoradd glue to pizza – there is a constant rataplan of stories about all the ways where AI bomb spectacularly .
This is , to put it roundly , the fault of a tech manufacture that ’s gotten way over its ski . In a rush to one - up one another , companies swan out features that seem like brilliant scientific discipline fiction but fall asunder into embarrassing and substandard functionality so immediately that the failures are often literally contained in the introduction of the production itself .
But behind that wafture of unreliable garbage , some awesome features emerge from using AI example . Apple has the luck to depict itself as the adult in the room , a company institutionalise to using AI for feature article that make its customers ’ live easily – not competing to do the best irreproducible sorcerous trick on degree .
Apple’s chips have had Neural Engines for years before other companies started having them. How many people really understand that it’s used for AI functions?
In doing so , it risks being seen as frumpy and behind . But if Apple can see beyond the latest technical school - industry hype cycle – and it ’s generally good at doing that – it can reckon on iPhone users being more concerned in genuine features than impractical nonsense .
Wrong way around
Historically , Apple has been a society with a very strong doctrine about young technologies : they should be give to solving the problem of material masses . Most technical school company have historically had this backward : they take delivery of some whizzy new technology smart off a manufacturer ’s conveyor smash and shove it into a intersection . The result tends to be products that are solutions desperately searching for problem .
The current AI hype gives off the puff of air of that particular stink . This is an chance for Apple to focalise on using AI applied science to solve real problems and trump those solutions while , yeah , bragging that they used AI to solve them .
Apple ’s chip have had Neural Engines for class before other company started having them . How many mass really understand that it ’s used for AI functions ?
Apple’s chips have had Neural Engines for years before other companies started having them. How many people really understand that it’s used for AI functions?
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The truth is that Apple has been doing this for historic period . It has used the musical phrase “ automobile eruditeness , ” lately discarded because AI is the catchphrase of the day , to analyze and process images in the Photos app for nearly a decade . AI feature permeate Apple ’s product already , and the company ’s been shipping AI - heighten Apple - designed processors – the Neural Engine , y’know – foryearsnow . Given how long it contract to plan and cook up microprocessor , that means Apple has been planning for this moment for ages now .
But now it needs to render .
Siri was introduced 13 years ago and was the harbinger of Apple’s AI efforts. Instead, it symbolizes how lacking Apple’s efforts have been
Careful to a fault
The sign of Apple being “ behind ” in AI is that it entirely missed the boat on the AI chatbot and content generation frenzy . concord to reliable reports , the company was take aback by the rise of those creature and has stimulate to catch up .
That ’s not the warning sign I ’d point to , though . It ’s more like a symptom of a larger trouble within Apple , which is that the party can be incredibly conservative when it comes to certain kinds of engineering , admit AI feature . You may have noticed that Apple has a bit of a dominance addict streak : it really wants to have complete ascendancy over the exploiter experience . The more you give an AI feature free rein , the more unpredictable it can be .
This has led some recess of Apple to resist many AI technologies because they ’re just not governable . And I think that ’s a sound pulsation , generally ! Tech sites freak out when literally anything Apple ships has a job , even if it ’s a smattering of defective iPhones that make weird noise or have green casting on their displays . By being conservative , Apple has keep itself lots of negative headlines about an “ AI - gate ” here or there .
But … that careful coming also probably explain why Siri is loosely considered to be lackluster at best and obstruct at worst . More than five years ago , Apple take away Google ’s AI chief and put him in charge of Apple ’s AI attempt . And yet here we are , five years later , and everyone ’s clamoring for Apple to explicate itself next calendar week .
I have to conceive that some of the reason Apple is in this spot is that it ’s been reluctant to flip the permutation on some AI features . By all account , there was a reckoning a twelvemonth ago , and we ’re about to see the result .
Features matter
I think Apple in all likelihood necessitate this kick in the pant from the rest of the tech world . The company operates at its beneficial when it ’s pressured by competition . It takes great pride in go around the cutting edge – but withbetterapproaches than its competitors .
Siri was introduced 13 class ago and was the herald of Apple ’s AI travail . alternatively , it symbolize how miss Apple ’s efforts have been
That ’s what Apple ’s announcement should be . Instead of chasing ridiculous demos , it should commemorate that it ’s build solutions to real problem . The features it buildsmatterbecause its customers do n’t actually care about Apple check the “ has AI ” box or hold up with a tech industry leaderboard . They do care that they can remove something pestiferous from the background knowledge of a photo , get a clear sum-up of their notifications while in Focus fashion , or ask Siri for something and get a percipient and accurate solvent without get defeated .
As you see the WWDC keynote and scan reaction to the promulgation here and around the World Wide Web , keep this question in mind : Will this make iPhone , Mac , or iPad drug user happy ? Or is it just happening to assuage investors , diarist , and other technical school - diligence insider ? The more times Apple does the former , the well its annunciation will be in the farsighted trial .
