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Ask HN: Is Apple about to be left behind?

by plg on 5/16/23, 12:12 PM with 9 comments

Within months (if not already) I think for most consumers Siri is going to feel like a third rate substandard AI assistant as google and Microsoft continue to weave their solutions into their product lines.

Is Apple about to be left behind?

Do they have a plan?

  • by frankjr on 5/16/23, 12:36 PM

    Is an AI assistant important for most people? I have used Siri maybe once or twice, and have disabled it on all my Apple devices since.

  • by whywhywhywhy on 5/16/23, 2:19 PM

    I think the release of the headset is going to be the most surreal moment.

    It's been in production for so long and its clear they felt it was just around the corner at least 5 WWDCs ago. But it's also clear they were originally aiming for an unobtrusive glasses form factor for wearing all day and have at some point recently pivoted to more of a "MacBook Pro of AR" work focused but more powerful form factor. As the narrative changed from "The Glasses" to "The Headset" at some point.

    Interesting to see how this will play out or if it'll be another iPad or if it'll be more like the Oculus Rift where everyone who bought one raved about it and they sold 7 figures of them but ultimately it petered out.

  • by gregjor on 5/16/23, 12:17 PM

    Do you think many Apple users will switch phones and tablets for ChatGPT and Bing? Switch to what? Do you think most Apple users even use Siri?

  • by PaulHoule on 5/16/23, 12:15 PM

    Get somebody to release a better voice assistant in the app store?

    It seems like more of a problem for the XR headset they are supposedly releasing in the fall because the whole point of that kind of thing is keeping your hands free. It’s a risky problem for Apple to release for many reasons but people probably will call out the weakness in the voice assistant.

  • by jdoehxoshsha on 5/16/23, 12:19 PM

    apple own your phone. they can decide to allow bard, bing, alexa to access you calendar or be able to automate things... or not.

    that strategy already worked for search. they don't have it, so they make others pay to be there, and it net them 1bi a year from google.

    next i guess they will just get 1bi from whover for the privilege of serving all siri replies.

    until people ditch iphones, or merely push back to owning the device, apple will win no matter what.

  • by Frummy on 5/16/23, 12:16 PM

    No, 85% of revenue is hardware

  • by slater on 5/16/23, 2:32 PM

    > Is Apple about to be left behind?

    No.

    > Do they have a plan?

    Most certainly.