I would guess these are very carefully planned reveals and not everything they're working on. Yes, Apple is extra secretive... but since they are copied very often and quickly... you can't blame them.
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Apple's Culture of Secrecy Slowing its Artificial Intelligence Development
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I would guess these are very carefully planned reveals and not everything they're working on. Yes, Apple is extra secretive... but since they are copied very often and quickly... you can't blame them.
Apple maintain secrecy as part of their strategy to make the best products in the world. If they felt it would be beneficial to that goal to share with and participate in the larger AI community, they would do so.
I'm not worried about Apple's strategy behind developing AI for their products. And I'm glad they are firm in their stance around their users' privacy.
I'm not worried about Apple's strategy behind developing AI for their products. And I'm glad they are firm in their stance around their users' privacy.
Apples closed innovation model is good for incremental improvements, but not so much for radical, or "revolutionary" changes. My PhD dissertation examined some issues in this research area. Apple will almost always be a strong close follower, but it will rarely define entire new industries. With that said, this is still a profitable business strategy although I don't foresee Apple producing many new products that will mimic the success of the iPhone.
Apple's strict adherence to an environment of secrecy and privacy in regards to its software and hardware development has been suggested as a major blow to the company's potential for growth in the field of artificial intelligence. In a new article by Bloomberg, Apple was noted as a non-attendee at the Neural Information Processing Systems conference, an annual confluence of companies including Google and Microsoft where researches get together to discuss the progress and development of AI technologies.
In years past, Apple has attended the conference, but its emissaries were known to keep "a low profile" during the proceedings. In the midst of a mass sharing and celebration of discoveries and findings in the world of AI, many remain unsure of the Cupertino company's continued success in such departments if it remains attached to such strict secrecy rules. "They're completely out of the loop," said Richard Zemel, a professor in the computer science department at the University of Toronto.
The biggest threat posed to Apple due to this level of secrecy, according to Trevor Darrell, managing director of a machine-learning research center at the University of California at Berkeley, is the barrier to entry it creates for graduate students fresh out of college. The stagnant environment and closed-off atmosphere inhibits the company's employees from interacting with the rest of the scientific community, an issue that most potential hires may not be entirely comfortable with.
Earlier in the month, Apple acquired two artificial intelligence-related start-ups: VocalIQ and Perceptio. VocalIQ's natural language API hints at a more naturalistic version of Siri in the future, and even possible integration into the rumored Apple car project. Perceptio suggests the possibility of a more expansive and robust AI system for Apple, without the compromise of the company's in-depth privacy policies that pull Siri back from services like Google Now and Microsoft's Cortana.
All the same, Bloomberg's story suggests that despite Apple's enthusiasm to innovate in the artificial intelligence sector, the company could continue to lag behind in certain departments -- Apple Maps, for example -- due to its stances on secrecy and privacy.
Article Link: Apple's Culture of Secrecy Slowing its Artificial Intelligence Development
What does sharing in AI research have to do with user privacy?
Seriously? Apple was NOT there? How many times has apple submitted a patent or other legal documents in a different name to protect their identity and what they are working on? Apparently it's no secret that they do it frequently, so who's to say they weren't there under a different name.
Secrecy doesn't usually make products any better. It does make them seem more desirable when they're revealed
Apple partly counts on this surprise factor for initial sales. That's why they hold back reviews until the last minute. They don't like people having a long time to mull over pros and cons, or to lose the excitement of "something new".
Apple also doesn't like direct competition, which is what they know will come after they start selling a product. Secrecy gives them some breathing room, because few of their products' features are difficult or unusual to duplicate.
However, secrecy can make products worse. A good example was the problem with the iPhone 4 antenna being hidden by field testers all using cases. And it's not just the camouflage. Testers are also discouraged from talking to each other, which allows problems to sneak by.
Still, it's understandable at least from the patent standpoint these days, since it's now all about who files first, not who invents first.
As far as technology advancements, one is not better than the other, nor harder to achieve. It's different paths with different pressures. You certainly can publish papers either way--excellent pure science is also done at the corporate level. Applied science is also published after competitive and IP concerns are addressed, which, by the way, are also much more critical concerns of fund-strapped universities nowadays--they like those patents and royalties and university incubator startups that have to pay back the investment.
There's really a convergence of these separate paths that's going to happen as we go forward in the next couple of decades.
That would better fit Apple's "innovate" vs. "invent" model. Unfortunately that means Apple has to wait till someone else invents it. Which leads us back to researchers right from collegiate ranks .....
You actually just said apple "will rarely define entire new industries." First, that's kind of high bar for measuring the success of any business, innit? Second, how many times does a company have to "define entire new industries" before it's not seen as a rare thing any more?
OMG it's Barrister Siri - Law AI of Apple (coming soon to an Apple Store near you)
I think most people can't or won't acknowledge why it's lagging so bad behind other solutions. I'm done using it. The AI has barely improved over the years.
I've gotta ask ..... What entirely new industries has Apple defined?
I would say that they reshaped the portable electronics industry. Before Apple, MP3 players, smartphones, and tablets were generally a mix of difficult to use and poorly executed products. Apple took existing technologies and made the available and appealing to the masses. This is still a significant source of Apple's success although iPhone sales have marginalized the impact of iPods on the overall revenue.
Good point, but in fairness, that question probably should've been directed at the chap I was quoting. Apple has substantially re-defined entire categories. Who originally defined the smartphone category? Blackberry, maybe? Whoever it was, they're relegated to a wikipedia entry, because Apple redefined it with this crazy thing that had no keyboard and no stylus. Now there are dozens of smartphone manufacturers mostly making devices that run on Android, but Apple seems to be the only one that figured out how to make it profitable. iPad wasn't the first tablet out of the gate by any means, but when it was introduced, people laughed and wondered why anyone would want one. The watch is now getting chuckles and even though initial sales have dwarfed all the competitors, critics are trying to somehow cast it as a failure. The jury's still out, but I personally wouldn't bet against it. Apple didn't invent small apps either, but they pretty much created a billion-dollar cottage industry for people who write and sell high volumes of small apps at low prices.
"The really strong people don't want to go into a closed environment where it's all secret," Bengio says. "The differentiating factors are, 'Who are you going to be working with?' 'Am I going to stay a part of the scientific community?' 'How much freedom will I have?'"
This is a really good point. I'm a current graduate student who once interned with Apple and, surveying my post-graduation options, I'm hesitant to return. Researchers at many tech companies (Google, Facebook, Microsoft, etc.) often publish papers in peer-reviewed journals, meaning they can be involved with both the industry and the academic community. This is obviously much less likely to the case at Apple.
Nothing against Apple ... in many ways I prefer their culture (and certainly prefer their products), but I do believe that driving away prospective R&D employees is a necessary side effect of secrecy.
This is a really good point. I'm a current graduate student who once interned with Apple and, surveying my post-graduation options, I'm hesitant to return. Researchers at many tech companies (Google, Facebook, Microsoft, etc.) often publish papers in peer-reviewed journals, meaning they can be involved with both the industry and the academic community. This is obviously much less likely to the case at Apple.
Nothing against Apple ... in many ways I prefer their culture (and certainly prefer their products), but I do believe that driving away prospective R&D employees is a necessary side effect of secrecy.
I don't think most of the people posting in this thread have had any experience in academia and the expectations of contributing to the science in a peer-reviewed environment. This isn't about being limited by your mindset. It's a core value of scientific research, regardless of your field.
Scientific advancement, whether it is theoretical physics or applied technologies, thrives in an environment of open discourse, argumentation, and building on one another's work.
The article raises a serious issue that Apple is going to face if they try to advance in a field like AI (which is realistically still in its infancy) if it can't draw out the best and brightest researchers in the field by preventing anyone working for them from participating in the basic interactions with their peers in the field.
Few sciences can make revolutionary advances by putting a few people in a closed off room, regardless of what movies might lead you to think. If Apple withdraws from the discourse, it almost inevitably will face a future of playing catch-up, not being at the cutting edge.
(disclaimer: I've got a PhD in astronomy, not computer science, but I've got a more than passing familiarity with the mindsets of researchers across many disciplines.)
Nothing. It was mentioned at the end of the article as another thing that could be holding Apple back.
You can point out the flaws in any strategy. I didn't say it was perfect. But it's the path they've chosen, not just from a marketing perspective, which I wasn't even talking about, but because they understand that there's a huge difference between the product the intend to make, the product they iterate towards, and the product they release.Secrecy doesn't usually make products any better. It does make them seem more desirable when they're revealed
Apple partly counts on this surprise factor for initial sales. That's why they hold back reviews until the last minute. They don't like people having a long time to mull over pros and cons, or to lose the excitement of "something new".
Apple also doesn't like direct competition, which is what they know will come after they start selling a product. Secrecy gives them some breathing room, because few of their products' features are difficult or unusual to duplicate.
However, secrecy can make products worse. A good example was the problem with the iPhone 4 antenna being hidden by field testers all using cases. And it's not just the camouflage. Testers are also discouraged from talking to each other, which allows problems to sneak by.
Still, it's understandable at least from the patent standpoint these days, since it's now all about who files first, not who invents first.
Companies that talk too much about what they're going to release end up releasing that exact thing, for better or for worse. Secrecy allows Apple to remain focused on making the best possible product, which only sees the light of day when they feel it's ready to be seen.
It's not a flawless strategy, and there are times you could argue they've wavered from it (hence my saying they would share with the AI community if they felt it was in their best interests), but it's been working pretty great for them so far, all things considered.
Eddy Cue should just make sure current services are good enough. They need another VP to control such a high-tech innovation. Please don't let Eddy rude ruin it.
I asked (you just happened to be lucky
) as I could not think of a single industry they defined (created). They innovated a lot. From pc's to mp3 players to smartphones to mobile devices. They do an awesome job at innovation and figuring out consumer mass appeal.I've talked to other professors who suggest the same. Or even think that Apple does no pure research.
The problem here isn't about product secrecy. The problem with Apple is about all the research that doesn't make it directly into a product. IBM (TJ Watson Labs), AT&T (Bell Labs), and Xerox (PARC) used to publish (either in patents or in popular research journals) a ton of stuff that wasn't going into products as trade secrets. These companies became national assets due to their lab publications. Only a percentage of research findings were kept as trade secrets for competitive reasons.
If Bell Labs didn't publish their discovery of the transistor, license out the technology, and make William Shockley famous, Silicon Valley, and thus Intel and Apple might have never come into existence. Think about what the world would be like if only telephones were transistorized, with no transistor radio or televisions (etc.) until after AT&T's patents expired. If Bell Labs didn't publish how long distance telephone calls worked, then Woz and Jobs might never have designed and sold their first product ... again leading to no Apple.
Apple rarely ever publishes research findings. There is no published Apple Labs technical journal. Apple keeps way too much as trade secret in the eyes of many researcher scientists and engineers. Top researchers want to publish their discoveries. What's the value to them of a great discovery if Apple sticks in on the shelf as an unused trade secret?