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Apple today announced John Giannandrea, who handles machine learning and AI for the company, has been promoted to the Apple's executive team and is now listed on the Apple Leadership page as a senior vice president.

Giannandrea joined Apple as its chief of machine learning and AI strategy in April 2018, stealing him away from Google where he ran Google's search and artificial intelligence unit.

johngiannandrea-800x324.jpg

At the time, Apple said Giannandrea would lead the company's AI and machine learning teams, reporting directly to Apple CEO Tim Cook. Giannandrea took over leadership of Siri and combined Apple's Siri and Core ML teams.

According to Apple's press release announcing the promotion, Giannandrea's team has focused on advancing and tightly integrating machine learning into Apple products, leading to more personal, intelligent, and natural interactions for customers while also protecting user privacy.

Apple CEO Tim Cook says that the company is "fortunate" to have Giannandrea at the helm of its AI and machine learning efforts.
"John hit the ground running at Apple and we are thrilled to have him as part of our executive team," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "Machine learning and AI are important to Apple's future as they are fundamentally changing the way people interact with technology, and already helping our customers live better lives. We're fortunate to have John, a leader in the AI industry, driving our efforts in this critical area."
Prior to joining Apple, Giannandrea spent eight years at Google, and in the time before that, he founded two companies, Tellme Networks and Metaweb Technologies.

Giannandrea's April hiring came amid ongoing criticism of Siri, which many have criticized for its shortcomings in comparison to AI offerings from companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google. Apple made serious strides improving Siri in 2018, building out the capabilities of the AI assistant with features like Siri Shortcuts in iOS 12.

Article Link: Apple AI Chief John Giannandrea Gets Promotion to Senior Vice President
 
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Jingmoreno

macrumors newbie
Jun 26, 2018
3
28
"Hey Siri", please send additional assistance to help rectify bent iPad Pros, throttled i9 MacBook Pros, iPhone 7 Plus speaker problems, MacBook/MacBook Pro butterfly keyboards...

Sorry, Zac, There Is No More Throttling On i9 MacBook
 
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tyr2

macrumors 6502a
May 6, 2006
826
217
Leeds, UK
With the 'Neural Engine' in the new A chips and a serious leadership focus on AI, I have high hopes for what Apple can achieve in this space.

While Google has had the advantage by pooling user data and analysing it in the cloud, Apple can leverage their new CPU's to perform a significant amount of AI training on device, aggregating this anonymously then again performing inference on the device. If they can maintain their focus there's a real chance to deliver a great product and maintain privacy. IF they can maintain their focus that is...
 
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CWallace

macrumors G4
Aug 17, 2007
11,937
10,563
Seattle, WA
It doesn't matter if your half-assed AI software doesn't work, you can still get a promotion at Apple.

If that was true, they would have promoted the person originally in charge of said half-assed software instead of hiring Giannandrea earlier this year to make it only third-assed or quarter-assed (which is likely grounds for a promotion, considering). :D:p
 
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RickInHouston

macrumors 65816
May 14, 2014
1,457
2,210
Good move? He's been in charge of AI. Everyone is aware how good Siri is (sarcasm). And this guy gets a promotion?
 

SirithX

macrumors 6502
Feb 21, 2007
432
136
San Francisco
Lol are people really complaining about the promotion here because Siri is still half-assed? Do any of you complainers have any idea as to the full scope of his work or his team's work, and what things looked like prior to his hire vs right now?

Siri is just one (albeit major) component of what his team does. Tech companies are not like sports teams, where a new manager comes in and is expected to change everything around within one year. Not to mention you can't be expecting immediate public-facing improvements either – a lot of the work of a VP or SVP is on the back-end and in things like systems, processes, infrastructure, building the team, culture, etc.

Please think before complaining. If immediate, public-facing action were the only thing to get you promoted in business then our economy would be in shambles.
 

Jimmy James

macrumors 603
Oct 26, 2008
5,488
4,067
Magicland
If he doesn’t perform is he Gonorrhea?
[doublepost=1545334742][/doublepost]
Good move? He's been in charge of AI. Everyone is aware how good Siri is (sarcasm). And this guy gets a promotion?

To be fair everyone else’s digital assistant is a data mining b*tch. They’re like the hot girlfriend that cheats on you while you’re home in the other room.
 

Justanotherfanboy

Suspended
Jul 3, 2018
851
1,369
Using this as a progress report and not much has changed. Still needs a lot of work.

https://www.reddit.com/r/sirifail

I get that you were just trying to “make a funny” or whatever.... but it kinda backfired.
I actually followed the link, b/c I haven’t visited that Reddit in like a year, & wanted a good laugh.
Following your advice, using it as a progress report- I showed top posts from the last week.
There were only like 3 and ZERO of them were actual fails.
One was Siri playing a song when they had actually had asked Alexa to play it (correct song recognized & played), one was someone making the awkward request “find my iPhone find my iPad” & complaining that it brought up choices of several models of iPhones they own, etc.
Hardly the laugh-fest I remember.
I guess you really can use it as a progress report! =)

As an aside....
Yesterday I tried to use Google Translate to figure out what the Japanese writing on the Netflix anime character, from Agretsuko’s forehead says.
The app feature that can look at an image & supposedly pull out the kanji characters said it translated as scorpion. Using different tools to find the character & paste it into the translate web app then yielded column...
Yeah... so, turns out it says rage.
Guess nobody’s AI is anywhere approaching perfection?
 

HiRez

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
6,250
2,576
Western US
Apple made serious strides improving Siri in 2018, building out the capabilities of the AI assistant with features like Siri Shortcuts in iOS 12.

Well, they added features, but the problem is Siri is still broken at the most basic level (understanding what you say and interpreting what you are really asking for). I speak in a clear voice with no discernible accent, I try to take extra care enunciating and even forming my sentences to Siri for clarity (but what I don't really consider natural speech patterns), and she still gets it wrong I would say well over half the time. I rarely even bother with any type of complex query because I know I'm just going to get a comical, frustrating response. I don't call that "serious strides".

Remember, it's (Him being hired by Apple) been 9 months only.

Right, this really isn't his thing yet. This is like blaming Obama for the terrible economy in September, 2009. I don't know much about this guy but I already have a ton more confidence of him being in charge of Siri than when Eddy Cue was running it.
 

now i see it

macrumors G4
Jan 2, 2002
10,567
22,032
Problem is...
Once that slider is flipped to OFF, (out of disgust) it's unlikely anyone will turn it back on. And for giggles if someone gives it (her) another chance, the slider is immediately turned OFF again never to be thought of again.

image.jpeg
 
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