OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been • Hacker News Board

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#61

Post by RyanShook » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:51 AM UTC

In terms of useful AI agents, Siri/Apple Intelligence has been behind for so long that no one expects it to be any good.

I used to think this was because they didn’t take AI seriously but my assumption now is that Apple is concerned about security over everything else.

My bet is that Google gets to an actually useful AI assistant before Apple because we know they see it as their chance to pull ahead of Apple in the consumer market, they have the models to do it, and they aren’t overly concerned about user privacy or security.

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#62

Post by huwsername » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:52 AM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #10

> This is exactly what Apple Intelligence should have been... They could have shipped an agentic AI that actually automated your computer instead of summarizing your notifications. Imagine if Siri could genuinely file your taxes, respond to emails, or manage your calendar by actually using your apps, not through some brittle API layer that breaks every update. And this is probably coming, a few years from now. Becaus…

I don’t believe this was ever confirmed by Apple, but there was widespread speculation at the time[1] that the delay was due to the very prompt injection attacks OpenClaw users are now discovering. It would be genuinely catastrophic to ship an insecure system with this kind of data access, even with an ‘unsafe mode’.

These kinds of risks can only be _consented to_ by technical people who correctly understand them, let alone borne by them, but if this shipped there would be thousands of Facebook videos explaining to the elderly how to disable the safety features and open themselves up to identity theft.

The article also confuses me because Apple _are_ shipping this, it’s pretty much exactly the demo they gave at WWDC24, it’s just delayed while they iron this out (if that is at all possible). By all accounts it might ship as early as next week in the iOS 26.4 beta.

[1]: https://simonwillison.net/2025/Mar/8/delaying-personalized-s...

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#63

Post by janalsncm » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:53 AM UTC

I think there is a contradiction between

> the open-source framework that lets you run Claude, GPT-4, or whatever model you want to

And

> Here’s what people miss about moats: they compound

Swapping an OpenAI for an Anthropic or open weight model is the opposite of compounding. It is a race to the bottom.

> Apple had everything: the hardware, the ecosystem, the reputation for “it just works.”

From what I hear OC is not like that at all. People are going to want a model that reliably does what you tell it to do inside of (at a minimum) the Apple ecosystem.

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#64

Post by CuriouslyC » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:54 AM UTC

fooker wrote: post #11

> I suspect ten years from now, people will look back at 2024-2025 as the moment Apple had a clear shot at owning the agent layer and chose not to take it Ten years from now, there will be no ‘agent layer’. This is like predicting Microsoft failed to capitalize on bulletin boards social media.

If you're arguing that in 10 years we won't have fully automated systems where we interact more with the automation than the functionality, I've got news for you...

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#65

Post by neumann » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:55 AM UTC

Telemakhos wrote: post #43

crazygringo wrote: post #10

> This is exactly what Apple Intelligence should have been... They could have shipped an agentic AI that actually automated your computer instead of summarizing your notifications. Imagine if Siri could genuinely file your taxes, respond to emails, or manage your calendar by actually using your apps, not through some brittle API layer that breaks every update. And this is probably coming, a few years from now. Becaus…

Apple's niche product, consisting of like 1-4% of computer sales compared to its dominant MacBook line, is now flying off the shelf as a highly desired product, because of a piece of software that Apple didn't spend a dime developing. This sounds like a major win for Apple. The OS maker does not have to make all the killer software. In fact, Apple's pretty much the only game in town that's making hardware and softwar…

What are you referring to?

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#66

Post by Aurornis » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:55 AM UTC

OpenClaw is a very fun project, but it would be considered a dumpster fire if any mainstream company tried to sell it. Every grassroots project gets evaluated on a completely different scale than commercial products. Trying to compare an experimental community project to a hypothetical commercial offering doesn't work.

> They could have charged $500 more per device and people would have paid it.

I sincerely doubt that. If Apple charged $500 for a feature it would have to be completely bulletproof. Every little failure and bad output would be harshly criticized against the $500 price tag. Apple's high prices are already a point of criticism, so adding $500 would be highly debated everywhere.

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#67

Post by Der_Einzige » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:57 AM UTC

neumann wrote: post #65

Telemakhos wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's niche product, consisting of like 1-4% of computer sales compared to its dominant MacBook line, is now flying off the shelf as a highly desired product, because of a piece of software that Apple didn't spend a dime developing. This sounds like a major win for Apple. The OS maker does not have to make all the killer software. In fact, Apple's pretty much the only game in town that's making hardware and softwar…

What are you referring to?

[flagged]

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#68

Post by Schiendelman » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:58 AM UTC

nerdsniper wrote: post #40

verdverm wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

get off your devices when driving, it's as dangerous as being drunk behind the wheel

You don’t look at it, you just talk to it and it can talk back to you. It’s more just having a conversation with a personal assistant while driving. Which is a pretty common thing to do.

That is nearly as dangerous - it causes inattention blindness.

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#69

Post by lanakei » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:58 AM UTC

neumann wrote: post #65

Telemakhos wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's niche product, consisting of like 1-4% of computer sales compared to its dominant MacBook line, is now flying off the shelf as a highly desired product, because of a piece of software that Apple didn't spend a dime developing. This sounds like a major win for Apple. The OS maker does not have to make all the killer software. In fact, Apple's pretty much the only game in town that's making hardware and softwar…

What are you referring to?

Probably the Mac Mini. A few OpenClaw users are buying the agent a dedicated device so that it can integrate with their Apple account.

For example: https://x.com/michael_chomsky/status/2017686846910959668.

Re: OpenClaw is what Apple intelligence should have been

#70

Post by ajcp » Thu, Feb 05, 2026, 1:58 AM UTC

neumann wrote: post #65

Telemakhos wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's niche product, consisting of like 1-4% of computer sales compared to its dominant MacBook line, is now flying off the shelf as a highly desired product, because of a piece of software that Apple didn't spend a dime developing. This sounds like a major win for Apple. The OS maker does not have to make all the killer software. In fact, Apple's pretty much the only game in town that's making hardware and softwar…

What are you referring to?

Mac-Minis