Apple Rumored to Follow ChatGPT With Generative AI Features on iPhone as Soon as iOS 18

[bsan]

I am extremely content with Apple taking their time incorporating generative AI and LLMs into the ecosystem.

The competition seems to be throwing things at the wall to see what sticks. I’d much rather have a polished, highly-functional, useful generative AI implementation than a half-baked one.

I’m particularly concerned about the data and privacy implications of generative AI and LLMs. As the article alludes to, I believe this is the primary reason Apple is taking much longer than Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, etc. to roll out the headlining AI features.

Word. It cannot be emphasized enough that we're still in heavy AI hypesummer. That doesn't mean there's no value to be had in the new tech, but nobody seems to be thinking hard enough about what it actually means for their project beyond marketing... what place are these things going to have when the market finally breaks under the oversaturation? And they all want to go with closed, gross, and heavily logged OpenAI nonsense.
In theory, the 15 Pro/Max is already capable of comfortably running some more lightweight LLMs on-device (7B@4bpw => 3.5GB RAM, more than enough for a Siri-supercharging integration) so Apple has ground to stand on if they wanted to go into the space cloud-free.

 

[henkie]

I am extremely content with Apple taking their time incorporating generative AI and LLMs into the ecosystem.

The competition seems to be throwing things at the wall to see what sticks. I’d much rather have a polished, highly-functional, useful generative AI implementation than a half-baked one.

I’m particularly concerned about the data and privacy implications of generative AI and LLMs. As the article alludes to, I believe this is the primary reason Apple is taking much longer than Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, etc. to roll out the headlining AI features.

I would not count on it to be the best of the bunch….Case in point: Siri….

 

[pugxiwawa]

How could it be based on Siri even if Apple wanted to?

Siri has nothing to do with AI, as all of its content is human curated.

You don't really believe all Siri content, knowledge and everything it knows are all curated by Apple manually right?

Wait, maybe you are right.

 

[Elmo1938]

I call that good news. Do it right the first time and do not rush😃

 

[neuropsychguy]

How are they going to come up with anything remotely resembling AI if they cannot get the basics right? I am rooting for Apple but Siri is a complete mess.

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For Apple building a generative AI feels a bit like Apple trying to compete with Google Maps with their very own Apple Maps. Despite their efforts Google Maps is and probably always will be light years ahead.

Or, you just ask it what version of iOS is on your phone and get the correct answer.

 

[JMO1]

Looking forward to this inclusion!

 

[jimbobb24]

What is "Generative?"

Is that the one that makes the wierd porn pics, or just the text based one?

Both

 

[henkie]

I hope people realize Apple has been working on this for at-least 3 years by now.

Yes and Apple released Siri 12 years ago….Biggest upgrade came with ios17: it can now set two timers at the same time!

 

[jimbobb24]

Just this month chatGTP Can listen. Has anyone tried it? Because this is the hardest part. Listening to voice and converting it to text is still very challenging.

 

[jimbobb24]

So what I’m hearing from someone working in the industry is that this is just phase 1 of Apple’s leap into generative AI.

Just like iMessages, it’s going to be encrypted and not even Apple will have knowledge of what the communication is between the AI and end user is.

Ultimately though, Apple hopes to bring this feature on device. Unfortunately neural engine right now is simply not powerful on current Apple Silicon chips. It won’t be until around A19 or A20 where Apple can finally cram neural engine powerful enough to have generative AI on device.

It’s not just the processor. It’s the gigabytes of data required to be in memory to make it happen. Server farms are running chatGTP. Local LLM and images are relatively limited by comparison.

 

[imgregorous]

How will the whole Apple privacy and security stance fit into that scenario, not to mention the extra hit on the battery?

I would argue that Apple's privacy and security stance is a logical fallacy. Meaning, they claim to maintain customers privacy by not sharing that data, but they're absolutely collecting it for their own purposes.

 

[Mr. Donahue]

Maybe they’ll call it “Apple i” and start bringing back the “i” for all devices! Boom! Full circle. Jobs was ahead of the curve!

 

[zinacef]

Untrue. The only advantage Google Maps has, at least here in the US, is that Google's point of interest database is a lot better. Navigation, Apple Maps is better designed and has much better voice prompts and graphics. Routing and traffic info is constantly updated thanks to millions of iPhone out there on the road.

We’re in Kauai on vacation and Apple Maps is more of a miss than hit, e.g., we asked it for directions to a local sandwich shop yet it directed us to the back of the shopping plaza/sandwich shop with a wall between us and the sandwich shop, saying, “You’ve arrived!”
On a couple of other occasions, it would say the same thing that we’ve arrived, only to drop us a quarter-to-half-mile off from the destination.
Can’t tell you the number of times we’ve been frustratingly lost with Apple Maps here.

 

[picpicmac]

supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said Apple's generative AI efforts were "significantly behind its competitors," so it's unclear

Can someone explain to me how a "supply chain analyst" is now an expert on AI? Or anything related to software that is not part of a supply chain.

 

[krull1015]

Will be interesting to see how Apple incorporates generative AI into their devices. iOS 18 is about a year out and it seems Apple is already lagging in AI. Hopefully it will not be integrated into Siri who is worthless…
Simple commands work about 50% of time, I can conduct my own web searches, most of the time Siri just doesn’t understand….😊

 

[CordovaLark]

This the same AI behind Siri that was finally able to identify Dogs in photos last year....

 

[CordovaLark]

Apple should perhaps learn from their past mistakes and not try to do this totally on their own. Just fork OpenAI/ChatGPT and integrate with Siri already.

Apple cannot do that. As they have a closed system and no data collection etc. Also reason why no major games ever come to IOS.

 

[3xBoom]

They said the same thing about newspapers telephones and the internet

And they were not wrong about them!

 

[evertjr]

I'm really curious how they'll handle it. No one is touching OpenAI and I can't see it changing any time soon, the voice assistant mode in ChatGPT App is just mind blowing, it can talk in multiple languages using the same very natural voice, even in the same response, OpenAI again outclassed everyone else. Imagine something this powerful with access and understanding of all the data in your device. I hope Apple is doing some dark magic to conjure a hardware powerful enough to run these kind of models on-device

 

[pugxiwawa]

Have you guys tried the new chatGPT voice assistant mode with the iphone 15s action button? This is truly mindblowing. It this could access the web and smart home devices and was a bit faster to respond, this is it. This is the startrek computer we've been waiting for!!

Is that only available with GPT4 (paid version)?

 

[obamtl]

How are they going to come up with anything remotely resembling AI if they cannot get the basics right? I am rooting for Apple but Siri is a complete mess.

View attachment 2298500

For Apple building a generative AI feels a bit like Apple trying to compete with Google Maps with their very own Apple Maps. Despite their efforts Google Maps is and probably always will be light years ahead.

Oooooh! But if you ask 'what version of iOS is on my phone, you might get a useful response'.

In other words, you're asking Siri wrong. ;-)

 

[NEPOBABY]

I call that good news. Do it right the first time and do not rush😃

There is no 'do it right' first time in software.

And bugs, crashes and updates and upgrades are forever.

We can't even get office apps, web browsers and image editors that have been around for 30-40 years to be decently bug free or stable.

Software bloat will always make maintenance a chore and these AI systems are super bloated and buggy, and will be forever.

 

[ignatius345]

POI is at least half of the map app functionality (location, work hours, how busy, reviews etc). Opinions about the voice prompts and graphics are very subjective.

And these subjective things have a real effect on my experience. No interest in looking at an ugly map with crappy, unintuitive prompts like "in 500 feet, turn right" -- as if I care to guess what the heck 500 feet is in a moving car

Out of those millions of iPhone users on the road, how many use Google Maps? Google have access to their data in addition to the data of Android users (about 50% in US?) and Apple has access only to iPhone data.

Sounds like a draw, at least in the US where iPhones are ubiquitous. I generally see roads change color to indicate traffic density in real time, and my ETAs are very accurate. Reroutes are good, and I'm also seeing more and more user-reported hazards, crashes, speed checks etc as people use Apple Maps more. Look, if you aren't using Apple Maps (which I'm sure you're not given your stated preference), you're probably missing out on how good it's gotten in the past few years. It's made HUGE leaps lately.

As far as points of interests -- yes, absolutely. Google Maps unequivocally wins there. So I do keep it on my phone for looking up businesses... which I then put into Apple Maps to navigate to. I don't know if/when Apple will ever catch up or buy some really good database of POIs, but somehow they are missing this admittedly big piece.

 

[ignatius345]

We’re in Kauai on vacation and Apple Maps is more of a miss than hit, e.g., we asked it for directions to a local sandwich shop yet it directed us to the back of the shopping plaza/sandwich shop with a wall between us and the sandwich shop, saying, “You’ve arrived!”
On a couple of other occasions, it would say the same thing that we’ve arrived, only to drop us a quarter-to-half-mile off from the destination.
Can’t tell you the number of times we’ve been frustratingly lost with Apple Maps here.

Sounds like that's a big blind spot! I have had great success in the continental US and Spain navigating exclusively with Apple Maps. I DID have one huge f-up in Spain due to an ambiguous street name and my unfamiliarity with the area not recognizing how wrong it was. But on the other hand, I've heard plenty of Google Maps horror stories as well.

One thing I will say: Apple responds to reports of errors very very quickly. Often within a day or two I'll get a message back showing they've fixed something I've reported.

 

[rafark]

10+ bucks a month for something that can compete with GPT4?

There’s no model currently available that can compete with GPT-4. And it’s not even close. It’s like how far was the iPhone from other mobile phones when it was introduced in 2007.

Then let’s not forget that Apple is terrible at AI and Ml in general.

Lastly, chatgpt 4 is $20/mo. Considering Apple usually charges more than the competition, a $10/mo AI at the level of Chatgpt 4 from Apple sounds like a joke (no offense).