The rumors are growing stronger and everything indicates the imminent arrival (iOS 18) of AI functions on our devices alongside Siri and surely implemented in other applications. The latest reinforcement of these rumors is the use of an AI application called “Ask” (question, being an imperative verb) that Apple reportedly distributed to some of its dedicated AppleCare employees to generate answers from data in its own database. In other words, they train their AI for AppleCare with this application.
The fact that Apple is betting big this year on introducing AI into its systems no longer seems to be a secret, with even Tim Cook stating how excited he is about the legacy of generative AI in 2024. Despite this, Nothing is official, nothing has been announced from Cupertino on this subject. However, Apple’s AI is simmering and we’ll be able to see it at WWDC in June.
According to MacRumors reports, Apple has already launched this pilot program in which the “Ask” application would provide assistance to employees specializing in AppleCare. This application would automatically generate answers to technical questions based on information from Apple’s internal database.
Ask generates a different answer each time you ask it depending on how you ask your question and the data you provide (such as the operating system or the device itself). The employees themselves would train the AI by marking whether or not the answer was useful for their roles.
“Hallucinations”, literally translated from Hallucinations in English, are usually a problem in generative language models. This is just a nice way of saying that chatbots tend to make things up and tell them to you with great confidence, making it seem like it’s the truth. The “Ask” tool would have attempted to prevent this behavior training only with its internal database and with additional controls that ensure that responses are “objective, traceable and useful”.
There is less and less of this technology remaining on our iPhones, iPads or Macs. Siri improvement is (finally) near. We will be able to generate and edit photos much easier and faster. A very good year is coming for software and for the possibilities that we will have with our devices.
