Apple: Apple ‘ignored’ AI hype at WWDC 2023, but not the technology; list of products that are got AI upgrades – Times of India

Apple seems to be not really smitten by the AI bug. The company did not once mention the word AI even once at the keynote at its annual developers conference WWDC 2023. The omission was in sharp contrast to how other technology giants such as Alphabet-owned Google and Microsoft have approached the AI hype recently. As a report in news agency Reuters says, Apple instead used words such as “transformer language model”, “machine learning” and “ML”, when talking about the company’s AI efforts. So much so that the company launched an high-end augmented-reality headset called the Vision Pro, which uses AI. It also introduced AI features as smaller, incremental upgrades to some of its products and apps, but still the word AI was not used per se.
Here are some of the Apple products that received AI upgrades:
* Journal: New journaling app uses on-device machine learning (ML) to suggest writing prompts based on users’ data such as photos, location, music and more.
* Autocorrect: Using an AI-powered language model and machine learning, the improved functionality is aimed to deliver better predictive text recommendations, in line with user’s writing style.
* Dictation: The dictation feature too has been enhanced.
* Live Voicemail: Called Live Voicemail, the feature is powered by an on-device neural engine. It generates a live transcript as the caller records their message. This means Live Voicemail allows you to listen to the voicemail as someone leaves it live, without having to pick up the call. Users will even be able to see a transcription of the call on their screen.
* PDFs in iPad: The feature uses machine learning to identify fields in a PDF document.
* Live Speech: This is a new accessibility feature. It allows iPhone, iPad, and Mac users to type what they want to say to have it be spoken out loud during phone and FaceTime calls as well as in-person conversations.
* Personal Voice: Personal Voice is another accessibility feature. It is for users who are at risk of losing their ability to speak. Apple says that this feature is a “simple and secure way to create a voice that sounds like them.”
* Adaptive Audio: The new feature for AirPods Pro delivers technology personalised audio experience, including automatically changing media settings based on user’s preferences and environmental conditions.