What's that OpenAI hardware even likely to be? The attempts at consumer AI hardware so far have had no compelling answer to "why isn't this an app on the phone I already have".
Same strategy as a Kindle, Fire TV or a Portal – a proprietary gateway to services they sell, probably sold at or below cost. It's in line with their work on ChatGPT voice mode and such.
Funnily enough Amazon did try making a subsidised smartphone with deep integration of their services and it was a disastrous flop. Kindle and Fire TV succeeded by not directly competing with smartphones, but rather complementing them by being good at things that smartphones can do but not well.
If OpenAI plans to fork Android into their own thing then I can't see it going any better than Amazon's attempt did, and if it's a wearable like Humane/Rabbit then it needs an answer to "why isn't this an app".
Kindle is good stuff though. On the other hand, I can't imagine what a dedicated device would bring to the table that a smartphone / tablet would not in this case...
It’s probably a wearable device and the most instant uncanny valley nerd alert device imaginable, that makes bluetools and google glass wearers seem almost normal.
Spend a few minutes with the multi-modal models and you can figure it out. It'll probably be closer to the humane AI pin, but with a better design (no stupid projector) and a better version of the model backing it.
yeah sorry i was only thinking about all the dumb ai gadgets that the grifters are raising millions to shovel us and are gameboys + llm or mics on your neck
I get the impression that OpenAI’s growth has made it harder to move at the pace of the market, both with competitors and in open source, to speak nothing of the internal drama with Altman’s leadership.
They’re not exactly short of funding, and it’d hardly be wise for big tech to consolidate all its funding on a single player. Hell, Claude has shaped up really well and it doesn’t have that distinct GPT flavour to its output.
Seeing that there might be downsides to support OpenAI, is there any harm in Apple sitting out "this round"? Are there not future rounds where Apple can reconsider talking with OpenAI?
Just taking a guess: the recent high-level exits from OpenAI may have contributed to Apple's backing away from talks with OpenAI.
Despite being known for making big bets on products, Apple has historically not really been big on huge M&A bets or financial investments into other companies.
Also from my experience it's the counterparty that should feel honored to be working with Apple rather than the other way around, which I suspect played a role here too.
> Also from my experience it's the counterparty that should feel honored to be working with Apple rather than the other way around
The Beats purchase was interesting in that I'm almost certain that Apple didn't need the technology for yet another set of headphones, but what they bought instead was the reputation/cultural allure of Beats, its founders and music catalogue.
I suspect Iovine and Dre are well beyond needing validation from or being "honored" to be working with Apple as both are such prolific creators in their own right(s).
Why would I invest in a company if I had the intention to buy it? I could give you $400, and hope you use it in the way I want, or I could buy you, and apply that $400 in exactly the way I want.
It was embarrassing a decade ago, now it's bordering absurd how a product with so much visibility and importance by a company who typically is extremely perfection orientated is so behind the competition.
I don't think Siri users get a lot of exposure to the competition. I've never used whatever Google's version is. I remember when Cortana came out on PC and I was like wtf is this, idk what it's called now, probably just Copilot which I imagine is useful because ChatGPT.
I’m of the opposite opinion: make Siri dumber please, make sure it does a handful of things reliably. I want voice control to my phone, I don’t want a chat bot. Siri is… okay at voice control, but if they just threw in the towel and admitted that it is really just voice control, they could stick to a finite list of things it supports, and that’s it.
Imagine, you could actually get a documented list of
the things Siri supports. And phrases that activate them, and always activate them. No fuzzy AI baloney, just “these phrases do these things.”
Save the “unlimited knowledge chatbot” feature for another app please.
"Apple Intelligence" was never ChatGPT. You would be prompted (if the app is installed, IIRC) to ask ChatGPT if the Apple Intelligence system was unable to process the request, or needed a larger set of expertise. It would then prompt you for permission to confer with it.
I understand Apple Intelligence is separate from ChatGPT in my device.
Not clear if Apple Intelligence on server side (Siri, etc) uses OpenAI or not in the background, even a private instance.
As for prompting for permission to confer with it on device, it would be great if I could point it at any model/endpoint I wanted as long as it was OpenAI API compatible.
I’d recommend reading Apple’s white papers on this. Even when a user opts (per request) to send data to OpenAI, it sends it obfuscated and requires OpenAI to not store anything. The only time something should be traceable to the user is if the user is signed in to OpenAI to access premium features.
• sentiment analysis on text messages and the notifications to determine if they are urgent or high priority (apple is working on this actually for ios 18.1)
• summarize many emails or notifications, at a glance.
• improve siri. instead of transcribing the users request, and asking siri to take action right away, feed that transcription through an LLM first to fix grammar issues. Or correct words that don’t make sense in the context. This could reduce errors when asking siri to do something.
• have siri support handling multiple requests in one shot. An LLM can trivially pick apart a run on sentence and structure it into an actionable array or siri requests. Like “hey siri turn off all the lights and close the garage door. Oh also please let my wife know that i’m on my way. Actually, let my kids know too. Also i need navigation to the party today, i think it’s in my calendar.”
There’s many subtle ways to improve the user experience here. It seems like you’re expecting this to change your life lol. Don’t believe the hype, there is no AGI anytime soon. But let’s not pretend there’s no value here. You just have to be a bit creative…
Yeah given NotebookLM and Gemini are basically on par in every way, they would be wise to just expand their search deal with the Goog and not let a new entrant come and eat their food
Actual discussion earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41677333
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