Apple is a hardware company. AI is not hardware. Apple AI will never be leading edge.
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The MacRumors Show: John Gruber Talks Apple Intelligence and the Future of the Company
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I'm guessing Apple might not want to continue turning over general knowledge questions to ChatGPT or any outside entity for very much longer, since that reduces Apple's control over the end-to-end "experience" and makes Apple look beholden to or dependent on an outside company for capabilities it could develop in-house. Whatever issues any AI outside Apple might have, Apple would get blamed for, whether or not Apple is at fault, and also any outside AI won't be fine-tuned for Apple's purposes, especially for maintaining data privacy. It's sort of the way Apple has looked at outside chip vendors for a while, wanting to replace them with Apple-built components built with Apple's purposes in mind.
As to whether that might mean Apple wants to build the same kind of general LLM or other form of AI to substitute for or even compete with ChatGPT, or whether Apple is planning to limit Siri's chatbot capabilities to mainly help interface the user with tasks on its various operating systems as you describe, and leave it up to users to choose their own outside AI/LLM for broader chatbot capabilities, I'm guessing we might know within the next year or so.
Apple has always considered itself both a hardware and a software company, integrating both together to optimize their interaction. Steve Jobs quoted, in his 2007 iPhone keynote, computer scientist Alan Kay: “People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware." And Tim Cook in 2013 said “Apple is not a hardware company,” but he meant this to emphasize Apple's focus on integrating hardware, software, and services to create (or at least attempt to create) a more or less unified user experience.
It's probably true that Apple AI will never be leading edge, but there's some chance it might still wind up being pretty good.
I use generative ML (to me, "AI" is kinda bogus) daily and I think the issue here is pretty simple. Most of the things they wanted to do, at a true Apple product level, were just not reliable enough with today's tech. It's no coincidence that their paper analyzing the lack of reasoning ability of LLMs came out shortly before we started hearing rumblings of issues or delays with Apple Intelligence. Honestly, using this stuff every day I'd say a 60%, or so, consistency of being actually correct is about what I've experienced from Gen ML across the board. The tech just isn't really capital-p Product ready. It's ready for nerdy/techy people to wrestle with and do some amazing things more smoothly than they could have before. But for the basic "consumer" it's nowhere near consistent enough, imho. An everyday "it just works" Apple user would be frustrated with pretty much everything out there. So they need to do a ton of work on both the ML and product fronts, just like everybody trying to make actual products with Gen ML.
Just my 2¢.
Just my 2¢.
Just get it right and secure Apple.
Daring Fireball's John Gruber joins us on this week's episode of The MacRumors Show to discuss Apple Intelligence and the future of the company.
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We talk through the reaction to John's influential "Something Is Rotten in the State of Cupertino" piece on Daring Fireball, which pointed out that Apple's credibility has been "damaged" by the delay in releasing key Apple Intelligence features such as personalized Siri. Subsequent reports revealed that Vision Pro chief Mike Rockwell has taken over the Siri team at Apple, which until recently was led by artificial intelligence chief John Giannandrea. Software chief Craig Federighi is also believed to have taken on more responsibility to turn Apple Intelligence around.
The company has altered its marketing strategy away from the "Hello, Apple Intelligence" tagline and the features are finally expected to launch sometime within the next year. With this recent context, we get John's thoughts on how the situation has evolved since he wrote his article, including on the proposed class-action lawsuits against Apple over false advertising. We also look at how Apple may present its suite of AI features at WWDC later this year.
Moreover, we reflect on the Vision Pro almost two years after its announcement, and John explains why he believes that the headset avoided the mismanagement that has mired apple Intelligence. We also talk through rumors about the second-generation Vision Pro headset that is expected to launch between fall 2025 and spring 2026 as a minor spec bump, simply upgrading from the M2 to the M5 chip. We also explore the highly anticipated lower-cost Vision headset, dubbed "Vision Air," and how this could be positioned when it launches.
We look at the state of Apple's smart home proposition and the HomePod amid rumors that the company's first smart home hub product has been delayed to 2026. The device is believed to be finished and was originally scheduled to launch in March 2025, but due to its reliance on Apple Intelligence its release has reportedly been shelved until next year.
Finally, we discuss the long-rumored foldable iPhone, pondering on what Apple is likely to do differently when it launches the device next year. The MacRumors Show also has its own YouTube channel, so make sure you're subscribed to keep up with new episodes and clips. See more of John's work over on Daring Fireball and on his podcast, "The Talk Show."
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If you haven't already listened to the previous episode of The MacRumors Show, catch up to hear our discussion about the latest iOS 19 and watchOS 12 rumors, upcoming devices, and more.
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Article Link: The MacRumors Show: John Gruber Talks Apple Intelligence and the Future of the Company
Wouldn’t you prefer to choose your own software and buy your own hardware and not be locked into anything? That’s what our money is buying the product. But when companies like Apple dictate what we can do with our own products we don’t even own them!!! It’s a sad state and way to do business. Apple is afraid so they lie, cheat, steal and block their way through anticompetitive practices. Sad world.
Without the software, there would be no ecosystem locking everyone in. So the software is paramount to Apple’s success more so than the hardware. Or at most it’s an equal balance.
I don’t think anyone has ever owned software. At least not since the 80’s, maybe. We own a licence to use the software, to make use of the intellectual property that it represents. But we don’t own it outright. Thus has it always been and always will be. I can usually buy the actual hardware outright but where’s the win? That hardware needs software to be useful. Even if I could own all those things outright I would still need someone to support that hardware and software for me. I’d still have a dependency. And pretty soon my data would be tied up in that combination of hardware and software. So I’d be practically locked in. Vendors have always dictated what we can do. Unless we’re going to make our own hardware and software we will have to use what we’re given. They are tools to enable us to do what we want in life and in many cases to make money. Nothing more. We don’t have to be defined by them.
As I said in my previous post, Apple are not perfect. But in my opinion I judge them to be better than most and certainly the least worst if you want to look at it like that. If you disagree and don’t want to use their products, you could always buy from another lying, cheating, anticompetitive business.
For the first time in more than a decade Apple is way behind the curve. They just simply seam unable to cope with the speed things are evolving around.
They have the hardware, but the software has been lagging for some time. Too much time.
Will see. The alleged cosmetic of comedic changes is meant to get them some time by presenting something that looks fresh. Will that be enough to compete with AI features? Who knows.
They have the hardware, but the software has been lagging for some time. Too much time.
Will see. The alleged cosmetic of comedic changes is meant to get them some time by presenting something that looks fresh. Will that be enough to compete with AI features? Who knows.
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Ya, I'm a few days late to the newness and nobody will ever get this far in the thread and read this. But, for the most part, I'd like to just [x] disable the whole entire sam Altman crawling around inside my OS. I can go side load him if I want the all pervasive everything of Open AI.
I... this is all feeling a lot like the early 1990s. Apple is phenomenal at a lot of things. Please not AI, or just let me connect the AI of my choice.
Siri, you've been my special friend for what feels like centuries, show me anything that is a triangle shaped graphic on my desktop. result, "here's 3 pics of your dog!" THAT'S what I expect from Apple! Plus, also, 18 new emojis because it matters.
Anyway, it'd be great if they defrosted one of Steve Jobs' clones soon, so he could behead everybody and reboot the magical kingdom. It's getting lost in the weeds again. But, with a lotta cash, and, iCrap!
Also AVP Is a great example of what’s wrong with Apple right now. He was wearing rose colored glasses and got it wrong, and he doesn’t want to admit it even now that they’re off
I’d agree with you except that’s exactly what Apple did
It shows Apple isn’t the leader anymore because the people at the helm aren’t strong enough to say no to bubbles and trends
I digress. I think Apple has been a company producing products where software is intertwined with hardware, a symbiotic streamlined relationship.
The problem in my mind is that Tim business strategy focused so much on trapping and milking user in the middle of that relationship. That worked very well for immediate financial gains … truly amazing financial gains. So much that the company was able to become a Hollywood movie production company, a news agent, a fitness company.
But also contrived the build up of solid innovation in its space for the last 5 years or so. Apple is truly behind the curve on this one. The same thing happens to Microsoft some time ago, when Steve Balmer and its MSN, Studios when was in charge … iPhone came and … another one bites the dust.
Apple will be ok. But will be interesting its agility working … or not.
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Hartley gets that a lot.Completely off topic but was anyone shocked that the voice from the fellow on the right? It wasn't what I expected.
My concern is that with the obsession/ delay with Apple intelligence plus the threat of tariffs are going to greatly delay the products we really want to see from Apple.
Bottom line is Apple should have been farther along with AI than they were. Siri had been pretty stupid for well over a decade. Apple rested on their laurels and didn't do anything about it. When AI was being developed by their competitors they decided they had to arrive at the AI party late.
Bottom line is Apple should have been farther along with AI than they were. Siri had been pretty stupid for well over a decade. Apple rested on their laurels and didn't do anything about it. When AI was being developed by their competitors they decided they had to arrive at the AI party late.
Well, it depends how you're thinking of it. Apple's "thing" is being the best "latecomer" by producing really slick products and, in that way, taking the "lead" over the pioneers of the actual tech. So they may find the leading edge in actual AI-based products. Though so far they're not living up to their reputation, given the Apple Intelligence delays. Too bad. I hope they manage to turn things around, but I'm a bit skeptical given the actual functional state—in terms of reliability/repeatability—of current AI. I'm not at all sure it's Apple-product ready (and yes, I do use it every day, and periodically test all the major platforms... super useful to me, but still kind of a pain).
I'm not sure why people still harp on Apple for not being able to bring AirPower to market. Sure they hyped it stupidly, as if it was a given that they'd be producing it, but the design issues required to keep its multiple charging coils from generating too much heat, which was damaging devices placed on them, turned out to be too impractical to overcome just for the benefit of being able to place devices anywhere on the charging pad. Shortly after, we got MagSafe, so we still got wireless pad-style charging, with the only difference being that our devices need to be carefully positioned on top of the charging pad's coil (which the magnets ensure) to achieve proper power transfer. Big deal.
Haha... agreed. They most certainly didn't "fail" but rather chose. They likely ran the numbers and found they just couldn't sell enough, given the competition and the near impossibility of really innovating in the space, to be compelling against what's out there. Particularly given their tendency to offer the premium option of a tech. What is a "premium" charging mat? I mean, seriously???... In some ways it's kinda weird they even bothered researching it.
I can understand the appeal of a charging mat where you can place your devices anywhere on it, rather than having to carefully make sure they're placed right on top of where the coil(s) are located, as with Qi wireless charging. That would sort of be a premium charging mat, compared to Qi. But Apple came up with a workable alternative with Magsafe, which in effect guides your devices to be placed directly on the charging coil.
Apple should have added google Gemini to handle AI. Apple has screwed up my work flow so bad! How did Passwords go from a one click delight to the jumbled mess it is today?
Yeah, true. Fair enough. Still, I think they basically just didn't see a market.