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Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

cnbc.com

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Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#21

Post by Angostura »

rvz wrote: post #14
Noaidi wrote: post #3

Guess I am not using Siri anymore… By the way, have any of you ever tried to delete and disabled Siri’s iCloud backup? You can’t do it.

You're using Siri? lmao That's the Internet Explorer of chatbots.

That's where people get confused - it's not a chatbot or an LLM - it's a voice command interface. Adding something to the shopping list, setting a timer, turning up the heating in the back room, playing some music, skipping a track, sending a message - it works perfectly well for - and that's what I use it for virtually every day.

This work is to turn it it into something else, more like a chatbot, presumably

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#22

Post by Angostura »

johnthuss wrote: post #10
charliebwrites wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why so? Apple explicitly acknowledged that they were using OpenAI’s GPT models before this, and now they’re quite easily switching to Google’s Gemini

The ChatGPT integration was heavily gated by Apple and required explicit opt-in. That won't be the case with the Gemini integration. Apple wants this to just work. The privacy concerns will be mitigated because Apple will be hosting this model themselves in their Private Cloud Compute. This will be a much more tightly integrated solution than ChatGPT was.

And you don't think they will include an abstraction layer?

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#23

Post by johnthuss »

Angostura wrote: post #16
johnthuss wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest NEW thing here is that this isn't white-labeled. Apple is officially acknowledging Google as the model that will be powering Siri. That explicit acknowledgment is a pretty big deal. It will make it harder for Apple to switch to its own models later on.

I don't see why - iOS originally shipped with Google Maps as standard, for example. Macs shipped with Internet Explorer as standard before Safari existed

The Google Maps situation is a great example of why this will be hard. When Apple switched to their own maps it was a huge failure resulting in a rare public apology from the company. In order to switch you have to be able to do absolutely everything that the previous solution offered without loss of quality. Given Google's competence in AI development that will be a high bar to meet.

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#25

Post by manuelmoreale »

hu3 wrote: post #9
Noaidi wrote: post #3

Guess I am not using Siri anymore… By the way, have any of you ever tried to delete and disabled Siri’s iCloud backup? You can’t do it.

You guys use Siri?

My exact reaction every time I hear people discuss Siri. I don’t think I used it once in my life and it’s one of the first thing I turn off every time I have a new device. So interesting to see how different people use the same devices in completely different ways.

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#26

Post by mdasen »

johnthuss wrote: post #4
gnabgib wrote: post #2

Related: Apple nears $1B Google deal for custom Gemini model to power Siri (71 points, 2 months ago, 47 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45826975

The biggest NEW thing here is that this isn't white-labeled. Apple is officially acknowledging Google as the model that will be powering Siri. That explicit acknowledgment is a pretty big deal. It will make it harder for Apple to switch to its own models later on.

Where does it say that it won't be white-labeled?

Yes, Apple is acknowledging that Google's Gemini will be powering Siri and that is a big deal, but are they going to be acknowledging it in the product or is this just an acknowledgment to investors?

Apple doesn't hide where many of their components come from, but that doesn't mean that those brands are credited in the product. There's no "fab by TSMC" or "camera sensors by Sony" or "display by Samsung" on an iPhone box.

It's possible that Apple will credit Gemini within the UI, but that isn't contained in the article or video. If Apple uses a Gemini-based model anonymously, it would be easy to switch away from it in the future - just as Apple had used both Samsung and TSMC fabs, or how Apple has used both Samsung and Japan Display. Heck, we know that Apple has bought cloud services from AWS and Google, but we don't have "iCloud by AWS and GCP."

Yes, this is a more public announcement than Apple's display and camera part suppliers, but those aren't really hidden. Apple's dealings with Qualcomm have been extremely public. Apple's use of TSMC is extremely public. To me, this is Apple saying "hey CNBC/investors, we've settled on using Gemini to get next-gen Siri happening so you all can feel safe that we aren't rudderless on next-gen Siri."

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#27

Post by runjake »

Noaidi wrote: post #3

Guess I am not using Siri anymore… By the way, have any of you ever tried to delete and disabled Siri’s iCloud backup? You can’t do it.

Unless Apple is lying:

On iPhone, Settings → iCloud → Storage → Siri → Disable and Delete

Edit: Tried it. It works for me. Takes a minute though.

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#28

Post by dewey »

johnthuss wrote: post #4
gnabgib wrote: post #2

Related: Apple nears $1B Google deal for custom Gemini model to power Siri (71 points, 2 months ago, 47 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45826975

The biggest NEW thing here is that this isn't white-labeled. Apple is officially acknowledging Google as the model that will be powering Siri. That explicit acknowledgment is a pretty big deal. It will make it harder for Apple to switch to its own models later on.

Don't think that's an especially big deal, they've always included third party data in Siri or the OS which is usually credited (Example: Maps with Foursquare or TomTom, Flight information from FlightAware, Weather data and many more).

Re: Apple picks Gemini to power Siri

#30

Post by dewey »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #17
eimrine wrote: post #13

Why they are constantly so bad at AI but so good at everything else?

it's pretty Apple-ish to not jump into a frenzy, and wait for turbulence to settle, i believe. delegation to Gemini fits that theory?

They've tried to have an AI assistant before AI was a big thing...it's just pretty bad and Siri never got better.

If it would suddenly get better, like they teased (Some would say, lied about the capabilities) with Apple Intelligence that would fit pretty well. That they delegate that to Gemini now is a defeat.

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