Is Siri a Scratch from the Generative-AI Sweepstakes?

Or is Siri This Generation's Clippy?

At the current moment (current Stardate 768552.2 – yep, there is) we live in a world where AI (and its enablers such as machine learning) running multiple elements of our day to day lives.  Yet, we’re all freaking out to various degrees about AI in the form of large-language models like ChatGPT et al and when – not if – it will ruin economic opportunity for many and, probably, destroy the world. 

To paraphrase William Gibson, perhaps but the benefits (and/or possible destruction) will be unevenly distributed. So, you know, hope for the best.

One company that looks to be missing out on the AI gold rush: Apple.

Which is weird since it was Apple that first real tangible application of AI (that wasn’t a robot vacuum cleaner) for lots of humans.  Siri was billed as a “virtual assistant.”

So why aren’t we engaging with our iPhones and their many applications using Siri? For the first few months of Siri, it was great if asking her what the score of the Warriors game is something you did more than once a day.  But when you tried to ask Siri to turn the volume down on iTunes – nothing. (Siri now does duck the volume when you ask.) Siri can launch Apple’s integrated apps but that’s about it. Oh, there are a few apps that have gone to the trouble of integrating Siri but according to developers in multiple media reports, writing the extensions to enable the app is non-trivial.

Given the past several months of LLM-mania, is Apple biding its time or did the company commit the unpardonable sin (for Apple) of missing a major shift in the human-machine relationship?  I’m thinking that it’s because either: a) Apple lacks the imagination (unlikely) or b) is hooked on hardware. 

I’m going with b).  It seems that Apple’s unwilling to say out loud, at this point, that a fully developed Siri that seamlessly links a user’s physical and online worlds and allows enhanced navigation of both means there’s less reason for customers to fetishize the iPhone/iPad/AppleTV etc., etc. I’m hoping that this is a temporary moment of indecision at Apple.

Two recent developments make me think this. The first is that OpenAI released a ChatGPT app for the iPhone. This was a no-brainer for OpenAI but this should be an existential moment for Apple’s leadership and its board. Second, the news that Tim Cook is pushing for a launch/introduction of a mixed-reality headset, despite pushback from multiple execs.

While Apple will get a 30% of whatever money ChatGPT extracts from users of its app, how long before some of those app users want ChatGPT to “Open Keynote and give me 10 slides mixing the text and appropriate charts from the key findings of FTC’s Investigation into Apple’s . . .”

The fact that Cook is allegedly pushing for a mixed-reality headset — a class of product that no matter what Apple does will still make users look like dorks — is puzzling. It’s not like the headset manufacturers like Oculus have suddenly broken through to create a stampede of buyers. So, if I’m a shareholder (and I’m not) this focus on a device category that’s so very un-Apple should be watched very carefully.

Unless, of course, the plan is to head-fake the market with the headset. Instead, Apple could introduce a headset that has no physical controllers (like Oculus) but is, in fact, controlled by a rebuilt Siri. The user’s experience is totally defined by conversing with Siri and maybe some physical gestures tracked by the headset’s multiple cameras.

Maybe Apple’s got a crack team on this, and they’ve been working for a year – or maybe a few months – on enhancing Siri and creating a magic new interface for iPhones, iPads, Macs and Apple TVs. 

Maybe, at the end of Tim Cook’s keynote at the upcoming Worldwide Developers Conference in June he’ll finish the demo he’ll turn to the audience and dare to utter “there’s one more thing.”