Cook 'incredibly excited' about generative AI coming to Apple gear later in 2024

AppleInsider

Tim Cook says that Apple is spending "a tremendous amount of time and effort" on AI features that will be announced in the coming months.

A Siri icon superimposed on Apple Park

Apple's Cook took the opportunity of the firm's latest financial earnings call to enthuse about the Apple Vision Pro and the future of AI. "We are announcing these results on the eve of what is sure to be an historic day as we enter the era of spatial computing," he said. "Moments like these are what we live for at Apple, they're why we do what we do."

He said that this is "why we're so unflinchingly dedicated to groundbreaking innovation," and also "why we're so focused on pushing technology to its limits as we work to enrich the lives of our users."

"As we look ahead," he continued, "we will continue to invest in these and other technologies that will shape the future that includes artificial intelligence, where we continue to spend a tremendous amount of time and effort and we're excited to share the details of our ongoing work in that space later this year."

Cook initially said nothing more than that, and it was only an implication that the news would happen during the year instead of at the end. That does fit with recent reports that Apple will make significant AI and Siri announcements at WWDC in June.

In response to questioning about AI, Cook did expand on his brief statement. "In terms of generative AI," he added, "we have a lot of work going on internally as I've alluded to before."

"Our MO, if you will, has always been to to do work and then talk about work, and not to get out in front of ourselves and so we're going to hold that to this as well," he continued. "But we have got some things that we're incredibly excited about, that we'll be talking about later this year."

Perhaps the most significant element of Cook's promise of forthcoming news was how he set up that initial announcement. Apple is a technology company but also one that is very much focused on how it can "enrich the lives of our users."

Cook is saying that Apple is not leaping onto the AI bandwagon just in order to catch up with the rest of the industry. He's saying that Apple has been looking for a point for adding AI features -- and that it has found it.



Read on AppleInsider

omasou

I love how Cook had to keep explicitly mentioning AI, ML, etc. for all of the stupid ChatGPT enamored folks that don’t understand how much AI is baked into Apple products and software and how Apple Si has AI/ML supporting GPU and Neural Engine cores have been expanding year after year.

StrangeDays

omasou said:

I love how Cook had to keep explicitly mentioning AI, ML, etc. for all of the stupid ChatGPT enamored folks that don’t understand how much AI is baked into Apple products and software and how Apple Si has AI/ML supporting GPU and Neural Engine cores have been expanding year after year.

Right? When the folks say “But but but Apple is behind!” I’m always like…wut? Chat bots? Search engines? Letter writing wizards? Why do those things matter to anyone, let alone to Apple customers?

charlesn

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant technology--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. Siri debuted as an iOS app 14 years ago this month. Then Apple bought the company that developed Siri just two months later. Meanwhile, Amazon wouldn't debut Alexa for another 4.5 years--but it totally blew away Siri capabilities when it hit the market. How Apple frittered away a years-long head start in voice assistant technology is beyond me, but they did and Alexa became ubiquitous.

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence that there are specifics to tout--I guess he's hoping to have some by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

As a creative professional--you know, a prime target market for Apple--AI is already having a profound and beneficial effect on my work flow. And none of the tools I'm currently using are connected to Apple in any way. 

temperor

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant capabilities--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. 

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence--I guess he's hoping to have some meat on the bones by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

Yeah if you look at Siri as Apple’s AI effort you are wright, except Siri was never’s Apple AI effort, it was pre AI/ML era created and still is. If you see ChatGPT as smart, well until recently it could not answer a simple reasoning question like if it take 4 hours for a towel to dry outside in the sun how long does it take to dry 20, it did 4x20, just know they programmed that out to give the correct answer … (still hard to solve by AI so they are just faking the answer)

AI euh excuse me ML is being backed into every product since 2017 from a HW perspective, and FaceID was the real visible use of AI/ML of Apple, but to name just a few things that Apple has used ML more and more. The Translate App that is really fast and completely offline supporting dozens of Languages, recognizing objects and people in photo’s you can look up in your library. All the features that people with disabilities use, are almost all based on AI/ML. The dictation tool that works way better than Siri by the way, AI/ML, The autocorrect / suggestion, finally uses AI/ML and is finally descent … Centerstage … etc etc etc … So all in all things I use daily, while I used ChatGPT in the beginning for fun, I stopped using it, the initial high and wow has gone and some meh feeling took over. Yes for coding it has potential or for some very niche use cases it could be great, replacing jobs, but do we really want to replace humans buy a chatbot …

22july2013

All I want to know is whether Apple's version will give them access to my AI searches, (and to restrict them) or whether everything is done "on device." Is Apple going to deviate from its privacy-centric approach?

9secondkox2

temperor said:

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant capabilities--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. 

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence--I guess he's hoping to have some meat on the bones by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

Yeah if you look at Siri as Apple’s AI effort you are wright, except Siri was never’s Apple AI effort, it was pre AI/ML era created and still is. If you see ChatGPT as smart, well until recently it could not answer a simple reasoning question like if it take 4 hours for a towel to dry outside in the sun how long does it take to dry 20, it did 4x20, just know they programmed that out to give the correct answer … (still hard to solve by AI so they are just faking the answer)

AI euh excuse me ML is being backed into every product since 2017 from a HW perspective, and FaceID was the real visible use of AI/ML of Apple, but to name just a few things that Apple has used ML more and more. The Translate App that is really fast and completely offline supporting dozens of Languages, recognizing objects and people in photo’s you can look up in your library. All the features that people with disabilities use, are almost all based on AI/ML. The dictation tool that works way better than Siri by the way, AI/ML, The autocorrect / suggestion, finally uses AI/ML and is finally descent … Centerstage … etc etc etc … So all in all things I use daily, while I used ChatGPT in the beginning for fun, I stopped using it, the initial high and wow has gone and some meh feeling took over. Yes for coding it has potential or for some very niche use cases it could be great, replacing jobs, but do we really want to replace humans buy a chatbot …

Siri is just a marketing name for a series of scripts that act similar to an ai. Apple may just bake all of its generative ai into Siri or do a total revamp and move on smooth and sleek. 

While everyone else has a bajillion different apps to do limited things, apple can say”Siri has been here the whole time!” And all you have to do is tell Siri what you want. “Hey siri, create a website landscape by page with my name, photos of my family, and a 3D panda in similar style to the apple home page.” 

SIRI: “Done. Take a look, choose your favorite, and let me know when to upload.”

alternatively, they could name it Steve. That would be kinda cool. And have the ai render Jobs’voice 

dutchlord

Forget AI. When you release the 27 inch M3 iMac, Cook?

22july2013

dutchlord said:

Forget AI. When you release the 27 inch M3 iMac, Cook?

I'm using a 24-inch M3 iMac with a 27-inch HDMI monitor attached to it (in vertical orientation.) I'm happy.

tyler82

iOS and Mac OS still can’t figure out the username
and password fields of some websites I use, so autofill passwords don’t work (as just one example)

They have alooooong way to go. 

charlesn

tyler82 said:

iOS and Mac OS still can’t figure out the username
and password fields of some websites I use, so autofill passwords don’t work (as just one example)

They have alooooong way to go. 

Yep. While I prefer Safari as my default browser, I have to keep Firefox on my Mac, iPhone and iPad for the times when Safari simply will not interact properly with a website, This could be the issue you mentioned above or it could be buttons that are either inoperable or don't appear at all with Safari. Some claim this is an issue with the website, not Safari, but all I know is that Firefox always works. 

Afarstar

dutchlord said:

Forget AI. When you release the 27 inch M3 iMac, Cook?

Never going to happen. If they make a bigger iMac it will nearer 32”. I have an M3 24” model and the size is perfect. 

omasou

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant technology--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. Siri debuted as an iOS app 14 years ago this month. Then Apple bought the company that developed Siri just two months later. Meanwhile, Amazon wouldn't debut Alexa for another 4.5 years--but it totally blew away Siri capabilities when it hit the market. How Apple frittered away a years-long head start in voice assistant technology is beyond me, but they did and Alexa became ubiquitous.

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence that there are specifics to tout--I guess he's hoping to have some by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

As a creative professional--you know, a prime target market for Apple--AI is already having a profound and beneficial effect on my work flow. And none of the tools I'm currently using are connected to Apple in any way. 

Siri works fine for me.

Oh but Alexa is doing so well /s

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/amazon-lays-off-alexa-employees-as-2010s-voice-assistant-boom-gives-way-to-ai/

https://www.reuters.com/technology/amazoncom-cut-several-hundred-alexa-jobs-2023-11-17/

danox

22july2013 said:

dutchlord said:

Forget AI. When you release the 27 inch M3 iMac, Cook?

I'm using a 24-inch M3 iMac with a 27-inch HDMI monitor attached to it (in vertical orientation.) I'm happy.

I have a Mac Studio M2 Ultra (code-named Max Headroom) with a Apple XDR, I'm very happy using it but this quarter Apples financial report says Apple is leaving too much on the table by not offering big screen iMacs, Mac M2/M3 servers, Mac Pro and when combined with bad timing by not offering upgraded iPads before the start of the 2023 back to school buying season (starting 2nd week of August), a Oct 26 availability was too late and the same applies to the new M3 PowerBook laptops which were released on a even later date Nov. 7.

Any new/updated computer laptop/iPad Apple sells has to hit the streets mid August to catch the start of the back to school buying season to maximize sales? Which also gives a long run up to the Christmas buying season, yea it's tough but these are tough times those dates were missed. Apple did not maximize their opportunities. Mid August release time frame cannot be missed.

Apple is leaving real product possibilities on the table big screen iMacs, Mac M2/M3 servers, and Mac Pro's all may seem mundane when compared to the current AI hype or the Apple Vision, but some unglamorous computer trucks need to be built too the latest financials certainly indicate that. 

hypoluxa

I just want Face ID on my MacBook! And Siri to be smarter too....yeah. We'll get there..eventually.

dewme

Since we've gone off-topic ...

I’ve been using a Dell 32” 4K monitor on a VESA arm with my M2 MacBook Air. I find it to be an awesome setup on a 30” x 60” desk. It would be equally awesome with a nicely spec’d Mac mini. The 144Hz capable 4K Dell monitor plus VESA mounting arm combined configuration cost me less than one-half what a smaller what a Studio Display costs.  I had previously thought that 32” would be too big, but it’s a very nice size for a single monitor setup. There’s no denying that it is large and heavy and if I kept the stand it came with it would consume a fair amount of desk real estate. The VESA mount makes a world of difference.  By having the VESA mount I can position it in portrait orientation, but it seems ungainly when setup like this. In fact I do use the rotating mount to initially plug in the various cables because Dell has for some reason decided to make access to the monitor ports as difficult to access as possible. Rotating the whole monitor 90 degrees solves this problem. 

 

That said, I have no desire to start with a 32” screen and then tack on another couple of inches and pounds for the computer internals, or some sort of chin, much less have the whole thing locked down with the screen being part of the computer. I know different people have different opinions about this. The other snafu with iMacs is the inability to plug in other devices that share or take over the screen. The Dell has 2 HDMI 2.1 ports and 1 DP 1.4 port. 

I know I’ll catch flak from the iMac-or-Die crowd but I think that customers would be better served if Apple could produce a 32” 4K monitor that has at least 2 but possibly 4 inputs of the > 60 Hz HDMI and DP type and support for picture-in-picture and split screen in addition to native VESA mounting. Does this sound under spec’d compared to Apple’s XDR and Studio monitors? Hell yeah. But trying to convince someone that a Mac mini + larger than 24” Apple monitor is a viable alternative to a new 27”-32” iMac is a tough sell when the least expensive screen option is $1500 and only 27”. 

The only way Apple is going to hit a a monitor price that’s competitive is to spec it closer to what the 3rd parties are doing. Personally, if I had a choice between a 32” Dell monitor and a 32” Apple monitor, both spec’d the same, and the Apple unit being 10%-20% more expensive, I’d go with the Apple. But once Apple puts in their higher-spec stuff their price is 2X -10X what third parties are charging for lower-spec but still fully adequate alternatives. That makes the Mac mini + Studio Display (much less the XDR) as an alternative to a larger iMac unaffordable. This pushes more Apple customers away from buying Apple gear and keeps those longing for a new biggie sized iMac unhappy. 

MacPro

omasou said:

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant technology--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. Siri debuted as an iOS app 14 years ago this month. Then Apple bought the company that developed Siri just two months later. Meanwhile, Amazon wouldn't debut Alexa for another 4.5 years--but it totally blew away Siri capabilities when it hit the market. How Apple frittered away a years-long head start in voice assistant technology is beyond me, but they did and Alexa became ubiquitous.

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence that there are specifics to tout--I guess he's hoping to have some by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

As a creative professional--you know, a prime target market for Apple--AI is already having a profound and beneficial effect on my work flow. And none of the tools I'm currently using are connected to Apple in any way. 

Siri works fine for me.

Oh but Alexa is doing so well /s

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/amazon-lays-off-alexa-employees-as-2010s-voice-assistant-boom-gives-way-to-ai/

https://www.reuters.com/technology/amazoncom-cut-several-hundred-alexa-jobs-2023-11-17/

Thanks, beat me to it; I was going to point out the same thing.

mikethemartian

He is “incredibly excited” about everything.

charlesn

temperor said:

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant capabilities--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. 

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence--I guess he's hoping to have some meat on the bones by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

Yeah if you look at Siri as Apple’s AI effort you are wright, except Siri was never’s Apple AI effort, it was pre AI/ML era created and still is. If you see ChatGPT as smart, well until recently it could not answer a simple reasoning question like if it take 4 hours for a towel to dry outside in the sun how long does it take to dry 20, it did 4x20, just know they programmed that out to give the correct answer … (still hard to solve by AI so they are just faking the answer)

AI euh excuse me ML is being backed into every product since 2017 from a HW perspective, and FaceID was the real visible use of AI/ML of Apple, but to name just a few things that Apple has used ML more and more. The Translate App that is really fast and completely offline supporting dozens of Languages, recognizing objects and people in photo’s you can look up in your library. All the features that people with disabilities use, are almost all based on AI/ML. The dictation tool that works way better than Siri by the way, AI/ML, The autocorrect / suggestion, finally uses AI/ML and is finally descent … Centerstage … etc etc etc … So all in all things I use daily, while I used ChatGPT in the beginning for fun, I stopped using it, the initial high and wow has gone and some meh feeling took over. Yes for coding it has potential or for some very niche use cases it could be great, replacing jobs, but do we really want to replace humans buy a chatbot …

Not surprised that since you were using ChatGPT "just for fun," you got tired of your new toy quickly. But for creative professionals who know how to craft effective prompts for work, not for games, and then continue to refine their results, ChatGPT doesn't just save hours of work... it saves days. Those who can only see it as a not very useful toy will take a place at the front of the line to be replaced by it. 

charlesn

omasou said:

charlesn said:

Considering how badly Apple has fumbled voice assistant technology--Siri remains, as ever, the dumbest student in the class--I have concerns about how well it will deploy advanced AI capabilities. I am all-in on Apple devices EXCEPT when it comes smart speakers and voice-controlled lights and appliances. Part of the reason is because Siri continues to be frustratingly and profoundly stupid--but mainly, it's because Alexa and Google are in everything and Siri is not. Siri debuted as an iOS app 14 years ago this month. Then Apple bought the company that developed Siri just two months later. Meanwhile, Amazon wouldn't debut Alexa for another 4.5 years--but it totally blew away Siri capabilities when it hit the market. How Apple frittered away a years-long head start in voice assistant technology is beyond me, but they did and Alexa became ubiquitous.

I think Tim said what he had to say today for the benefit of Wall Street because Apple is simply not in the conversation when it comes to AI... except to ask, "Where is Apple in all of this?" which is not the question you want raised. The lack of specifics in what he said did not inspire confidence that there are specifics to tout--I guess he's hoping to have some by WWDC in June. And you can blah, blah, blah all you want about how much AI is already in Apple products, but it doesn't change the fact that, as a company, they are not in the AI conversation like MSFT, NVDA, GOOG, META, etc. 

As a creative professional--you know, a prime target market for Apple--AI is already having a profound and beneficial effect on my work flow. And none of the tools I'm currently using are connected to Apple in any way. 

Siri works fine for me.

Oh but Alexa is doing so well /s

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/amazon-lays-off-alexa-employees-as-2010s-voice-assistant-boom-gives-way-to-ai/

https://www.reuters.com/technology/amazoncom-cut-several-hundred-alexa-jobs-2023-11-17/

It really pays to look at the sources for what you read and not just the headlines. Since Amazon has never broken out Alexa separately in its quarterly reports, I was curious how anyone could possibly report accurately on the Alexa numbers. Well, there's an answer: they can't. What we know is that the division of which Alexa is a part has been losing money--the Worldwide Digital Services unit. At least, that's what "a person familiar with the division" told Business Inisder. Great source, huh? Not even an "Amazon employee who must remain anonymous." Know what else is in that unit? Prime Video. Now consider that streamers that charge $5-$20/month per subscriber have been losing money hand over fist on streaming... $1 billion per quarter in losses is not unusual with Netflix being the only exception. Amazon has made huge investments in Prime Video--half a BILLION on Lord of the Rings alone, which flopped--and they've been giving this streaming content away for free to Prime members. Gee, I can't imagine why that would be contributing to that division's financial problems. Know what else gets lumped in as an "Alexa" problem? The fact that Amazon loses a ton of money on its mediocre hardware line that it essentially sells at cost. This is because of Alexa? No, it's what happens when you try to sell "meh" hardware at unprofitable prices. No voice assistant can save you from that dumb strategy. 

danvm

omasou said:

I love how Cook had to keep explicitly mentioning AI, ML, etc. for all of the stupid ChatGPT enamored folks that don’t understand how much AI is baked into Apple products and software and how Apple Si has AI/ML supporting GPU and Neural Engine cores have been expanding year after year.

You are right that Apple has AI integrated in some of their products, but at the same time, they missed some opportunities.  One example is Siri.  They had a chance to have the best assistant in the market and didn't happen.  Another example is Apple suite of apps.  Microsoft and Google have done an excellent job by integrating AI into their apps, and Apple has done nothing. I don't think that people don't know or understand how Apple has integrated AI into their products. Is just that other companies have done a better job with AI than Apple with some applications and services.