It’s been a bad month for AI gadgets, and that’s saying a lot. As if the public opinion was not already in the hole after the reduction of personality associated with its AI Pin now, and R1, their reports, they have their problem of being an AI, you know … it works. But the fact that things are bad doesn’t mean they can’t get worse, and if the latest reports about Apple’s apple efforts are any indication, it could be.
According to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is running into a few hiccups with its new Robotic Home Hub, and I’ll give you one guess as to what some of those problems are. Per Bloomberg:
“The automotive system has had engineering challenges, and the company wanted to find compelling AI applications for this device. That’s taken out of the current timeline two years from now.”
Mechanical challenges are one thing (which feel like technical problems Apple can throw money at and eventually solve), but the AI part is not so easy. Designing useful AI features is not just a problem or an engineering problem; It is a philosophy. Before apple can figure out where to put its resources, it has to have the motive donating these resources. And if the wide field of AI gadgets is any indication, those reasons have never been today.
While there are plenty of AI features out there now (ie, all new and gemini-related in Google’s pixel devices), not many of them have been planned with consumers or given a compelling reason to use them. If you can’t convince people to use the AI features on a device they have in their hands for almost a second every day, it’s going to be more difficult to convince them on a device almost
Not to mention, everything is covered by nature-Gen Siri of everything. If there’s one place you’re looking for the next voice assistant, it’s the smart home hub, but Apple has (somehow) struggled to deliver on its promise, or at least work as it should. Those battles, by the way, are still going strong. an apple that should put in a while, given the truth.
Maybe apple will see things. The company doesn’t plan to pull its arm out – it has two more years, according to Bloomberg, and a lot can happen between now and then, but it’s hard to be optimistic about the way things are going. In Financial Times, Jony Heve and Sam Altman wrestle with every piece of their AI gadget (a palm-sized device you can bring on a trip), including how to get enough compute to use it in the cloud. Woof.
Obviously, there’s still a lot of work to be done before AI gadgets can be useful in the way that even the biggest companies are still trying to scale, but if there’s one company that can get you, it would be Apple. And if Apple can’t get the job done? Yes, I have bad news for Altman, ive, and company.
