Mediaboss Marketing

In the end, Apples highly anticipated AI announcements were very, well, Apple-y. You could practically feel that bite in the tech giants fruit logo as the company finally announced Apple Intelligence (how deliciously on-brand to take advantage of the technologys initials), which Apples Tim Cook touted will be personal, powerful, and private and integrated across Apples app and hardware ecosystem.

Apple, of course, has always been all about being a protective walled garden that provides comprehensive security measures but also plenty of restrictions for users, and Apple Intelligence will be no different. But it is that very personal context of the user within the Apple landscape, combined with the power of generative AI, that makes Apple Intelligence something perhaps only Apple could really do.

Apple has not been first, or anywhere near the cutting edge of generative AI, but it is betting on something else: an AI for the rest of usfor the billions of users who dont care about models or APIs or datasets or GPUs or devices or the potential for artificial general intelligence (AGI). That is, the normiesas those in the tech industry like to call themwho simply want AI that is easy, useful, protective of privacy, and just works.

The laundry list of features Apple executives promised to roll out across iPhone, iPad, and Mac OS devices was long. Siri is getting an upgrade that makes the assistant natural, more contextually relevant, and more personal. If Siri cant answer a question itself, it will ask the user if its okay to tap into ChatGPTthanks to a new deal between Apple and OpenAIand it will have on-screen awareness that will eventually allow Siri to take more agent-like action on user content across apps.

There will be new systemwide writing tools in iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia, as well as new ways for AI to help prioritize everything from messages to notifications. The fun factor is well-represented as well, with on-device AI image creation and the fittingly named Genmojis, which let users create custom emojis on the fly (think a smiley face with cucumbers on the eyes to indicate youre at the spa).

But unlike Google and Metas throw-everything-at-the-wall approach to integrating generative AI into their products, Apple is taking a different tack, putting a carefully designed layer of gen AI on top of its operating system. None of it, at least in Mondays demo, seems bolted on as an afterthought (like Metas AI-is-everywhere search bar in Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, for example). And none of it, in fact, really uses the word AI as in artificial intelligence.

The rebranding of AI as Apple Intelligence takes a technology consumers have heard and read about for more than a year (and which has often sounded frightening, futuristic, and kind of freaky), and serves it up as something thats soothingly safe and secure. Its the tech equivalent of a mild soap for sensitive skin, offering consumers a freshly scrubbed face with no hard-to-pronounce and potentially irritating ingredients.

Of course, Big Tech demos are notorious for big announcements that dont always deliver. And there were few details about important issues like the provenance of the data powering Apple Intelligence features, the terms of Apples deal with OpenAI for access to ChatGPT, and how Apple plans to deal with the inevitable hallucinations that will result from its AI output. After all, safe and secure does not necessarily mean accurate. When Apple Intelligence is released in the wild, so to speak, things are sure to get interesting, and messier.

The tech world is in a fierce battle to see which company will be able to take AI and turn it into the industrys next game-changer. Whether that is Apple or not remains to be seen, but the elegant simplicity of the Apple Intelligence announcements certainly puts Google, Meta, Amazon, and, yes, OpenAI on notice: AI may be complicated, but as Steve Jobs said, simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. Perhaps, AI companies will finally figure out how to keep it simpleand, as Jobs said, move mountains.

View post:

Apple's big AI announcements were all about AI 'for the rest of us'Google, Meta, Amazon and, yes, OpenAI should ... - Fortune