Apple's Camera-Equipped AirPods Confirmed: See Them in Action

[irusensei]

I hate the tik-tok generic ai voice. The pre-ai Siri already had a distinctive tone. Nowadays its no different than the same voice used on yt and x scam ads.

 

[spazzcat]

Creepy...absolutely hate the idea of a device trying to do my thinking for me. Don't need more brain-rotting experiences. And I'm not willing to contribute to our collective creep towards totalitarianism. I've been embracing my inner Luddite more and more.

I take photos of stuff all the time that I want to reference later, has nothing to do with thinking for me

 

[JulianL]

Oh my ..

So many concerns here.

I hope they don't get Airpods banned in gyms & locker rooms with stuff like this.

If Apple at least makes any camera-equipped AirPods easily visually distinguishable, by for instance making them a much darker colour (something that I know isn't very Apple - unfortunately for me because I prefer darker colours), that might at least reduce the chance of regular (not camera-equipped) AirPod users becoming collateral damage if such devices do get banned in certain places. Judging by the video Apple hasn't done that though.

 

[Mr_Ed]

It isn't 'creepy' it is how normal converstation works.

Person : Hey SirI what time does my Mom's flight get in today?
Sirei : 6:30 pm.
Person : what baggage claim terminal is for her flight?
Siri : Terminal C .

If Siri doesn't remember the first sentence then there is no way to resolve the 'her' pronoun. People use pronouns and previous references all the time ( he , it , them , this , etc.). Can't find the corresponding noun then really don't know what is being talked about.

What would be creepy is holding a conversation when what you are talking to can't remember the noun that occured 4-6 sentences back.

Pretty sure during one of the WWDC presentations Apple mentioned that Siri Intelligence has a iCloud history ( that is encrypted to only your account/devices). If the sevice has any kind of longer conversational abilities then it has to remember to do the resolutions of the ambiguous terms used. How much goes int othe cloud history ( or local history if have cloud turned off) probably should be a parameter the user sets. But Siri will be precieved as dumb as a rock if it is absolutely zero.


Remember the metadata about a book it just a 'short form' of what can already do now.

Person : Hey Siri create a Note about a book with the title "Foo bar Baz" authored by. Fred Flinstone.
Sire: oK created note "Book wit hthe title Foo bar baz authored by Fred Flinstone.


versus

Person : Hey Siri remember this book I'm holding up so. that you can see.
Siri: OK record the information about that book 'Foo bar baz' by Fred Flintsone.


End result is basically the exact same data. One is more verbose, but not any new material data recorded. Maybe there is a difference of whether the data is stuffed into the Notes app's file versus the Siri Intelligence 'memory' file. If want to keep it very long term it is probably safer in Notes. There is likley some 'rolloff' to Siri's 'memory' file.

The problem I see is the definition of “normal” conversation. To me a normal convo is one I have with humans, not machines. Those are the ones I’m concerned about. As the device wearer, you signed up to whatever was in the EULA, they did not. Regardless of location context, whatever someone says to you one on one is implied to be for your ears only unless stated otherwise. If you are in a crowded mall conversing with someone, neither of you expects you might jot be photographed, but what is said to you is still not for everyone at the mall, and it most certainly is not intended to be used for AI processing or training. Even if Apple were to say (for example, as we don’t know yet) the device ignores X, Y, or Z things, how does it conclude it should ignore them without some processing?

We have already seen that as AI models grow, they often outgrow the capabilities of hardware they may have originally been targeted to, so any notion of “on device” processing doesn’t actually hold water over time. After a couple of software updates, if you are asked where images or audio is actually going during a normal conversation, odds are you won’t be able to answer the question with any degree of certainty.

Why should anyone have any degree of trust for the device (or its wearer) if they are uncertain of the degree of privacy of any on to one conversation?

 

[willyx]

Not happening, Apple. I can take a photo with my phone or just write it down. I'm not wandering around places with AirPods in (not that I own any).

Cool story, bro

 

[iZac]

These people are morons though.

You're not wrong. But it doesn't stop them from existing and it doesn't stop them from screaming at the top of their lungs when they accuse a random stranger of recording them with their headphones. There will be a lot!

 

[spazzcat]

I have a drop-dead serious question about privacy as well as implications for potential criminal liability of what is typically considered among the worst of possible offenses. For obvious reasons, I will not expand upon the question, despite there being no end of related scenarios and associated hypothetical consequences. The variations on the theme are endless and mostly obvious.

What happens with the information fed to Visual Intelligence when a parent is wearing these camera-equipped AirPods while changing a baby’s diaper?

b&

I highly doubt that these have always record video. I guarantee there has to be some kind of siri activation. We don't even know if they record video or simply take photos for AI.

 

[SBlue1]

Face ID isn’t LiDAR?

He just used this term to educate the OP that the camera will surely not be Lidar or the technique FaceID uses to scan objects for 3D shapes rather than a real camera since otherwise it wouldn't be able to read the title of the book but just sense the shape of it.

 

[Sami13496]

This changes everything. People don’t even realize yet how significant this is. This will revolutionize the user interface. Soon, we’ll be looking at keyboards, mice, and trackpads in museums.

Is that a good direction for technology to take or not? There are certainly many perspectives to consider.

 

[123ABCDN]

So the video shows someone with very short hair. How will these work when someone has long hair that covers their ears? Are we going to see a new trend of people getting certain hairstyles just so they can wear camera equipped AirPods?

 

[SBlue1]

For one thing, streaming usable video over the bandwidth of something like Bluetooth LE is not possible; secondly, any other way to stream video to be able to record consumes too much energy to be sustainable with an AirPod’s tiny battery. Even Meta glasses had to have those thick legs to be outfitted with a bigger battery to enable recording. Come on people, do some basic analysis and you’ll see recording for more than a few seconds is not happening.

People will jailbreak it for sure. Nothing is stopping them from recording a low res 320x200 video in 10fps like the old security cameras. Or a full resolution photo.

 

[tocatlian]

The only way this would be acceptable is if the images captured are used solely by Apple for informational purposes, remain fully secured and inaccessible to users, are never shared externally, and automatically remove or obscure any identifiable people. Otherwise, I think it is a terrible mistake.

 

[tyranne201]

What if u see someone naked and save it for later? Creepy.

 

[SBlue1]

Chuckle. Does the Photos Appl today tell you who random people whose picture you take from a single picture?
Nope.

Or does it learn faces of family members you often take pictures of ( and folks have slapped on their Apple ID avatars?)

"In his famous 2011 privacy research at Carnegie Mellon University, Alessandro Acquisti used a cheap $35 standard webcam paired with off-the-shelf facial recognition software and public social media profiles to identify random strangers in public spaces."

Yeah. That was 2011. Surely nobody has done anything similar since then and has no intention to use cameras on glasses or earbuds to do this.

 

[SBlue1]

Funny how everyone trusts Apple with their savings, browser history and medical info but not when it comes to a simple closed loop camera system. Seems like you’re already blaming Apple for Meta and Google’s mistakes.

I don't mind what savings account you use. I don't care what websites you use. I just don't want people to record me in the locker room or the beach.

 

[MRrainer]

A solution looking for a problem. Who has ever thought “man I wish my AirPods had cameras on them”

Yes, but that is just you.
Who knows what other people want?

Personally, I'd be happy if they had a flat-back phone so it lays flat on the table so I can actually type on it. I don't really care about the camera. I cannot make much use of the vastly improved quality of the cameras since my XR.

I'm not a photographer, I'm not an influencer, I don't to TikTok, I don't record myself, others.

But apparently it's important enough for other people that they make buying decisions based on that.

 

[trash eighty]

So the video shows someone with very short hair. How will these work when someone has long hair that covers their ears? Are we going to see a new trend of people getting certain hairstyles just so they can wear camera equipped AirPods?

So people with long hair will immediately become more trustworthy? Excellent.

 

[SBlue1]

Clearly it isn't recording - they're not going to have the battery for that, THINK man!

It'll be a split second thing on request - which is probably low resolution or poor quality it only works half the time.

How can it read the small text if its only low resolution? How do you prevent jailbreaking and snapping a photo every ten seconds and sending it to your phone? How do you prevent other manufacturers making identical looking knockoffs with high resolution cameras?

Imagine sitting on a train and a creepy looking dude is facing you with cameras all the time.

 

[Rob__Mac]

The only way this would be acceptable is if the images captured are used solely by Apple for informational purposes, remain fully secured and inaccessible to users, are never shared externally, and automatically remove or obscure any identifiable people. Otherwise, I think it is a terrible mistake.

I think it's exactly what they're going to do - the camera isn't accessible by the user at all, it's just something Siri can access when you ask it to.

 

[SBlue1]

That’s exactly what will happen. In the UK various organisations have banned Meta glasses and as the backlash against such products grows the number of bans will only increase. If AirPods with cameras are released I guess those same organisations will include them in their ban and you just know that there will be confusion and non-camera equipped pods will probably be mistakenly included by overzealous officials.

Same in Germany. There are places that have rewritten their guidelines when the smart glasses came out that any electronic device that could potentially make photos or videos is banned. I have already seen no-smartglasses signs in doctors waiting rooms, public pools, in shops entrances and in offices. Now they will ban earbuds. Thank you Apple.

 

[rehkram]

This is just the latest triumph of technology over common sense. The Nerd Reich advancing in the ears of the creeps and the naive. Advocates of this should be shunned by all decent people, like flock cameras.

 

[2low_tech]

I'm thinking how much this will aid my visually impaired niece.

 

[bababooie]

great now pervs in the gym locker rooms will be shooting vids with their airpods

 

[alphaswift]

So you're walking around all day wearing AirPods? I'm too old for this ****. Pass.

 

[Will Co]

Same in Germany. There are places that have rewritten their guidelines when the smart glasses came out that any electronic device that could potentially make photos or videos is banned. I have already seen no-smartglasses signs in doctors waiting rooms, public pools, in shops entrances and in offices. Now they will ban earbuds. Thank you Apple.

It's certainly a possibility. Even if the new pods can only capture text or other context from an image and the image isn't stored for later retrieval, there will still be privacy concerns, and rightly so.

And I can imagine that it will only possible to tell the difference between normal and camera-equipped models with close scrutiny. And so the bad actor goes equipped with two pairs of 'pods; one with the cameras and one without. At the checkpoint, under close scrutiny, they offer up the "safe" pair and then once passed the checkpoint, switch to the camera equipped model. And thus a blanket ban on all 'pods ensues.