Apple Intelligence Revealed at WWDC
AI-created, human-edited.
This week on MacBreak Weekly, Leo Laporte, Andy Ihnatko, Alex Lindsay, and guest Mikah Sargent reacted to Apple's newly announced "Apple Intelligence" features that were a central focus of the WWDC keynote. While companies like OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft have rushed to showcase generative AI capabilities, Apple took a more measured approach by unveiling practical AI-powered additions into its core apps and device experiences.
The panel acknowledged that at face value, many of the AI features demoed, like intelligent note-taking in the Notes app and smarter recommendations from Siri, may seem relatively unexciting compared to AI models that can generate text, images, and code. However, they praised Apple for resisting the hype around conversational AI and language models and instead delivering AI enhancements tuned for how most people actually use their devices day-to-day.
"This was all about focusing on actual things that our intelligence is going to do built into our actual products right now," said Andy Ihnatko. Alex Lindsay added that Apple seems focused on "what 90% of people do 90% of the time" rather than chasing cutting-edge but niche AI capabilities.
The panel was particularly impressed by the AI-powered upgrades coming to the Notes app on iPad and iPhone, which can intelligently convert handwriting to typed text in the writer's own style, solve handwritten math equations, and even generate graphics based on rough sketches. "This goes to the promise of graphical screens and touch...it's going to sell a lot of iPads," predicted Leo Laporte
Another area of praise was Apple's emphasis on enabling these AI features through on-device processing and private cloud infrastructure rather than offloading data to third-party models. This sidesteps many of the privacy concerns plaguing other AI systems. "Apple's entire business model is based around privacy...they have a vested interest in keeping your privacy," noted Lindsay.
While some critics dismissed Apple's AI vision as playing catch-up, the MacBreak Weekly panel argued this pragmatic approach engenders more trust and will likely introduce AI-powered conveniences to the mass market before conversational AI finds mainstream adoption
"It made so much more sense than just saying 'Siri knows this, this, this about you'...it's going to matter to the people who use these devices regularly," said Mikah Sargent. The panel suspects more innovative AI features are in the pipeline as Apple lays the groundwork with this tactful first step into generative AI.
Despite some initial skepticism that Apple was late to the generative AI party, the panel was impressed by the company's considered approach to infusing AI into its core experiences. By focusing on practical, privacy-minded AI features tailored for its existing user base rather than demos meant to wow, Apple demonstrated an AI strategy that may prove more impactful and trusted than rivals who jumped headfirst into the AI hype cycle. The panel believes Apple has set the stage for rolling out even more innovative AI capabilities in the future, giving them confidence that the "Apple Intelligence" era will meaningfully elevate the experience of using Apple's devices and operating systems.
Become a subscriber and never miss an episode: MacBreak Weekly
