Apple isn't telling the general public about their AI research. It makes sense that they need to tell the shareholders what they're doing if the shareholders ask, in private of course.
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Major Shareholders Planning to Force Apple to Reveal Use of AI
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The point is that ai today is a parlor trick. Everybody is trying to get aboard a train where they don’t know the destination. There’s virtually nothing of substance that benefits customers in any meaningful way on a smartphone.
And thus bottom line was important. Interestingly, many things user complain about today were part of Job's vision.
Of course, but the comment was about Einstein's not using his research for bad things.
Context about the Manhattan Project and Oppenheimer is important as well - the bomb ended a war that could have lasted much longer and killed many more people.
Related article
Smartphone makers are dreaming of a 'supercycle' driven by AI. Analysts disagree
Smartphone makers are talking a big game about artificial intelligence this year. So much they think it'll drive a new "supercycle" for the industry.
The last “supercycle” in smartphones happened between 2010 and 2015, where in five years the market grew fivefold from roughly 300 million units sold per year to 1.5 billion units, according to IDC data.
That came at a time when smartphones were just starting to become mainstream thanks to the emergence of widely used applications: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Uber, Snapchat, Twitter, and Candy Crush Saga, to name a few.
“The growth happened not just because Apple launched the iPhone, or because Google launched Android,” Francisco Jeronimo, vice president of data and analytics at research firm IDC, told CNBC.
“What really made it successful, that supercycle, was the fact that people were able to get the internet in their pocket,” Jeronimo said, in a phone interview with CNBC.
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Can AI really kickstart another supercycle or is it just another novelty to consumers? It certainly will take a few years to determine that.
Indeed. I think people forget that when Jobs came back as CEO his first act was to kill almost all of Apple's product lineup to focus on products that could make money and get the company back to solvency.
No invasive AI, no generative AI, no dysfunctional AI (Siri) from you, Apple, please. Just assistive AI, for example in iMessage: I just sent a text to person A, left iMessage to do something else, return to send a message to person B. Type it in, send it, but accidentally to A because the A message box was still open. Assistive AI would notice that I was away and as a result prompt me to confirm that A was the intended recipient. There would also be the option in settings to disable such assistance.
Some of Apple's biggest investors are set to pressure the company tomorrow to reveal its use of artificial intelligence tools (via the Financial Times).
Apple's annual shareholder meeting takes place tomorrow, allowing those with a major stake in the company to put forward proposals. One resolution proposed by the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) asks Apple to disclose its use of AI and any ethical guidelines that the company has adopted regarding the technology.
The resolution is set to be supported by Norges Bank Investment Management and Legal & General, Apple's eighth and 10th-largest shareholders. Norges Bank, which operates the world's biggest sovereign wealth fund, wrote in its voting disclosures that Apple's board should account for "social consequences of its operations and products." Likewise, Legal & General said that Apple "discloses very little about its approach to managing AI-related risks."
Legal & General met with Apple to discuss AI, but it declined to increase transparency around its development and use of the technology. "Apple should be transparent in their uses of AI and their risk management processes," the company said.
The major investor advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services is encouraging Apple investors to support the AI resolution, arguing that Apple's guidelines "do not specifically identify the potential risks resulting from the use of AI" and, as a result, "there are concerns regarding shareholders' ability to properly evaluate the risks associated with the use of AI."
Meanwhile, Apple is urging investors to reject the resolution, claiming that "the scope of the requested report is overly broad and could encompass disclosure of strategic plans and initiatives harmful to our competitive position." Shareholder petitions in the United States are usually non-binding, but those that review support from more than 30% of investors usually put sufficient pressure on the company to act. Apple is widely expected to announce a range of new AI features for its devices at WWDC later this year.
Article Link: Major Shareholders Planning to Force Apple to Reveal Use of AI
That's a bit too broad. But the general feeling is that corporations really do primarily care about making money, and everything else is way down the list (if at all on the list of things a company cares about.)
At least in the US, the laws about corporations require them to make the owners' (i.e. shareholders') interests be with what a corporation executives are concerned.
There is another kind of corporation, a Public Benefit Corporation, which allows a company's executives to also consider social benefit for decisions. But few companies are PBCs.
So Tim Cook has to be concerned about the welfare of the shareholders, first and foremost. He has no choice in this matter.
If it is between chatbots fears with the press early last year and content copyright like how they discussed with news publishers/magazines earlier last year this whole fear of producing AI enhanced OS's is probably FUD based.
That AI clean up noise from long distance calls to make speech clear, or AI imaging processing for a iPhone cameras, or AI used to translate speech real time into other languages is not scary is it? Its been around for a few years now.
Its likely you not going to see their worse AI fears manifest even if Apple advertises what iOS 18 does is my guess.
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I‘ve nearly sprained an eye already thinking about the batpoop ai that’s coming in iOS 18. It’s going to be something absolutely ridiculous and I can already hear the audio in the over the top keynote presentation … “wanna turn the lights off downstairs? Just tell SiriGPT and she’ll get you web results for an auto parts store near you.”
Don’t forget Super Retina XDR AI magical eraser in photos, the first erasing tool ever on a phone!!! coming later in an update.
We think our users are going to love it.
I find it hard to believe this wouldn't replace many Macs if Apple allows the software to grow enough in that direction. I'd very happily use one of these in my home office instead of my Mac. The $3,500 isn't even that high if it replaces a couple monitors.
Agreed but my worry is that they keep this in the iOS world instead of taking it to the next level and adding even more features straight from MacOS. I’d love to see support for multiple users and user profiles even if it’s just limited to different Home Screens for different users at first.
As if the device has already replaced my iPad. I simply don’t use it anymore but am keeping it around for travel or for when my wife and I are sitting on the couch and I want to seem more present that I seem when I’ve got the device on. That is until Apple debuts shared experiences that allow users on the same WiFi network who each have a headset to watch the same content. If that happens she’s already said she wants one. As it stands now we share mine which is why I’d love to see support for multiple user profiles above and beyond just support for multiple users with differentApple ID’s in the way tvOS does it but at the moment it doesn’t do any of the above so any improvements in that area would be welcome. You’d like they’d want to support multiple users to allow them to move multiple light seals at $199 a pop along with potentially additional lenses (which you know they get a cut of) along with potentially multiple batteries as well.
I would love to say this is an absurd worry, as iOS can expand as large as Apple likes. But Apple hasn't expanded it enough to fully cover the iPad yet, and that's been out since 2010 already. So I absolutely share this concern.
