Google has continued to open up its AI to humans and Bing has even integrated ChatGPT’s language into its Bing search engine. Everyone seems to be working on artificial intelligence, despite the fact that it is not always considered safe. Could that also be the reason why we don’t hear about it from Apple at all?
AI and creativity
Apple is by nature a very creative company that often plays it safe. In recent years since the introduction of the AirTag, it has experienced that when it balances just on the edge of what is safe, it soon receives enormous criticism. Still, the company is certainly not against artificial intelligence. At least: the founder Steve Jobs, who unfortunately passed away more than ten years ago, saw the potential in AI. As far back as 1981, he said that artificial intelligence would enhance our skills and unlock creativity.
Of course, AI was very different in the 1980s, but it still seems to be true for the current state of AI. It can make us a lot more creative and give more room for creativity because it can do the boring jobs for us. So it doesn’t make sense that Apple itself is so quiet when it comes to artificial intelligence. After all, his ancestor certainly saw a lot of potential in it. Plus, although Apple has always pretty much followed its own path, it is of course also sensitive to competition. It is not for nothing that it has such strict rules when it comes to its App Store: Google does about the same with its Play Store.
Apple remains silent
So what could be the reason that we hear so little – or really nothing – from Apple about artificial intelligence? Is it because the company is mainly busy with other things, such as developing a car for the distant future, but also quite high-end VR glasses that we expect within a few weeks? It will undoubtedly be a reason, but at the same time Apple has time precisely because the others are kind of tumbling over each other. Moreover, it is probably even sensible to wait and see: the others will figure it all out and once there is a framework, Apple can always decide to participate.
It remains to be seen how things will turn out with artificial intelligence, for example in the field of legislation and regulations: will everything soon be as free as it is now? We recently wrote that the CEO of OpenAI has asked the US government to regulate AI companies. This can also influence the development of artificial intelligence. Apple CEO Tim Cook has also said that he thinks it is important to handle generative AI very carefully. The potential is being seen, but according to Cook, artificial intelligence is being talked about in many different places and there are still issues to be addressed, writes CNET.
The cat from the tree
That’s not a surprising stance from the company. Apple is usually not the big innovator that comes up with something first anyway. iPad wasn’t the first tablet, iPhone wasn’t the first smartphone, and iPod wasn’t the first MP3 player either. Apple always waits a bit before coming up with its own idea of what is revolutionary. That’s not to say it hasn’t been working on it for a long time, but it tends to be a bit more careful about it to make sure what it comes with is that Apple quality that fans of the brand love.
Once it does come with AI, we can probably expect that within its smart assistant Siri. Apple’s processors are also already equipped with AI: M1 and M2 perform much better as a result, according to Apple. But starting a chatbot, we don’t see Apple doing that very quickly. It will mainly be about making Siri a bit smarter, and the smart assistant can use that. It just has to be safe, knowing Apple, and that can’t really be said of a lot of generative AI right now. In short, Apple is watching the AI cat out of the artificial intelligence tree and we are not surprised yet. Although it has recently posted vacancies for people with knowledge of generative AI. Who knows, that cat will come out of the tree faster than expected.
