ai – Page 11 – Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3

Apple Intelligence Crawling Under the Skin for Some

Apple Intelligence is the latest AI effort upsetting web publishers.

As we learn more about Apple Intelligence how Apple is training its AI efforts is crawling under the skin of some web publishers. Apple has been reasonably transparent about how it’s crawling the open web and using data it can grab for its efforts. Even so that’s not sitting well with everybody. But that’s been an uneasy road we’ve all been on with AI in a general sense since those gates were thrown open by OpenAI in 2022.

Screenshot%202024 06 10%20at%2011.36.33%E2%80%AFAM. This is a sticky wicket. Web publishers justifiably don’t feel great about having their content grabbed, regurgitated and spit back out without some consent or control. The other side of that coin is that the info is on the open web and by and large folks can access it through a variety of methods. There’s also the reality that the horse is already far from the barn because most of these AI models have been doing the same thing Apple is doing. AI has a been both a cash grab and a content grab from the get go, because without the content there’s diminishing returns on the cash.

There are methods to exclude a website from being crawled. Dan Moren at Six Colors has posted a good piece on how to do so and what that could mean here. Keep in mind any method used for this only excludes content and data going forward. Federico Viticci at MacStories has already stated that he’ll be excluding his website going forward.

Also keep in mind that this isn’t the only way Apple will be putting Apple Intelligence to work. Regardless, this is going to be an issue to follow as we continue to learn more about Apple Intelligence, which is just the latest in these Artificial Intelligence efforts that we all need to pay attention to. Like it or not it’s here and a fact of life. AND this isn’t the only issue getting under some folk’s skin since Apple made its announcement.

As a side note, my reading list on Apple Intelligence continues to grow with both punditry and technical info that I discover along the way. I imagine that list will just keep growing.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Getting Smart About Apple Intelligence

Time to start getting smart about Apple Intelligence

Everybody on the Apple Intelligence Bus! Everybody on the bus! That sure seems to be the rallying cry from Wall Street to tech blogs and the pundit beat. It’s quite exciting but only in the way a trailer for the next big movie might get us excited. The story the feature will tell isn’t ready yet, and only those in the know have knowledge of the script and what secrets it might contain.

I’m not poo-pooing what Apple will be offering. I have no way to make any judgment on whether it’ll be the next big thing, the future of computing, a train wreck or an also ran. All we have to go on is a very polished presentation designed to illicit interest. Apple boldly promises Apple Intelligence is AI for the rest of us. If that proves to be the case it begs the question as to who are the “them” or “they” that aren’t “us.”

On a promotional level alone Apple achieved success and at the moment it looks like it accomplished one of its goals with the announcement. Wall Street is certainly jumping on the Apple Intelligence bus based. Investment trends don’t always prove that intelligence and common sense go hand in hand but the market has indeed moved with Apple setting a new record high.

If all or most of what Apple promises comes close to reality it indeed does look promising. But as most of us should have learned by now, technology promises, especially AI promises of late, can have some bumps along the hallucination highway.

The timing will also be interesting, given that most of this won’t be rolling out when new iPhones debut this fall. Apple may have shifted the focus and succeeded in swinging the spotlight squarely back onto itself and yet, all we really know at the moment are the promises with a big helping of “coming later this year” tagged on at the end.

That said, it is probably wise to add to our own knowledge bases with what we do know about Apple Intelligence to this point and going forward. To that end I’ve put together a reading list of what I’ve seen so far that attracts my attention. Some of it is punditry. Some of it is technical. All of it makes for interesting reading.

First up is an interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook by Josh Tyrangiel in The Washington Post. When asked what his confidence was that Apple Intelligence will not hallucinate Cook responded:

“It’s not 100 percent. But I think we have done everything that we know to do, including thinking very deeply about the readiness of the technology in the areas that we’re using it in. So I am confident it will be very high quality. But I’d say in all honesty that’s short of 100 percent. I would never claim that it’s 100 percent.”

John Hwang in Enterprise AI Trends lays out what he views as Apple’s AI Strategy in a Nutshell.From what I know his thoughts make sense to me.

Casey Newton says Apple’s AI Moment Arrives. Here’s a quote:

“The question now is how polished those features will feel at release. Will the new, more natural Siri deliver on its now 13-year-old promise of serving as a valuable digital assistant? Or will it quickly find itself in a Google-esque scenario where it’s telling anyone who asks to eat rocks?”

Craig Federighi did an interview with Michael Grothaus of Fast Company about Apple Intelligence.

For some historical context and picking up on the discussion on how this changes (hopefully improves?) Siri, M.G. Siegler gives us The Voice Assistant Who Cried Wolf.

Wes David on The Verge gives us a list of every new AI feature coming to the iPhone and Mac.

Security and privacy are two of the big picture concerns that accompany anything about AI in general. A couple of technical entries into the discussion that I find informative include Private Cloud Computer: A new frontier for AI privacy in the Cloud from Security Research and Introducing Apple’s On-Device and Server Foundation Models. Both are released via Apple and focus on privacy and responsible AI development.

A terrific interview with Tim Cook from YouTuber MKBHD. Most relaxed I’ve ever seen Cook in an interview.

Brian Fung of CNN takes a look at how Apple is handling your data with Apple Intelligence and the differences between Apple Intelligence and ChatGPT.

Sebastiaan de With ponders Apple’s Intelligent Strategy.

Michael Parekh weighs in with his thoughts on how Apple is thinking different.

Steven Aquino weighs in talks about how Apple’s efforts have the potential to affect Accessibility.

Peter Kafka has published a transcript of an interview with Ben Thompson. Here’s a quote:

The real risk is execution risk. Apple does have the luxury of coming to market later, and they benefited from a huge amount of research and improvements. Like shrinking down these models, giving them high efficiencies, so they can run on-device. They’ve had all those benefits.

What they are proposing to do — to actually orchestrate different apps and different bits of data — no one has done well, yet. Apple’s bet is they can do it well because they have the data, because they are on the device. But there is a real execution risk.

Will Knight on Wired suggests that Apple Proved AI is a Feature, Not a Product.

Some folks are concerned that one of the ways Apple is training its Apple Intelligence includes crawling the open web. If you run a website there are ways to exclude it from being crawled, but unless whatever data has already been crawled is jettisoned by Apple prior to a new training it’s a bit late. Here’s some coverage from MacStories and Six Colors on that. This issue will be one to watch in the future.

Jason Snell of Six Colors opines that Apple’s skin the game might not have been as willingly all in as Apple would have preferred.

Dwight Silverman of The Houston Chronicle wonders Will Apple’s new AI plans Help Siri Fulfill its Promise or will it disappoint again?

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

It’s time to share a little Sunday Morning Reading. Words on Apple, words on politics, words on loss, and some words on photography. Read some words.

This week Apple will hold its annual World Wide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) focusing eyeballs on Cupertino and what everyone expects to be Apple’s big push into the Artificial Intelligence game, now looking like Tim Cook’s version will be called Apple Intelligence. This has been no secret for quite some time. That said, Mark Gurman of Bloomberg seems to have gotten quite a few of the details, whether leaked or planted who really knows, on what’s about to unfold. Check out Here’s Everything Apple Plans to Show at It’s AI-Focused WWDC Event.

As a companion to that check out John Gruber’s take on Gurman’s Epic Pre-WWDC Leak Report. Gruber seems to think it’s indeed a leak and the folks inside Apple aren’t too happy. IYKYK

As I stated the focus will be on AI. I’m thinking it will be just as hard to cleanly view where this is all headed as it has been with announcements from other companies, given that no one has nailed down an AI or LLM that seems to live up to the promises or provide reliably accurate answers. Check out Google’s and Microsoft’s AI Chatbots Refuse to Say Who Won the 2020 US Election by David Gilbert.

Perhaps the best pre-WWDC piece for providing some pre-perspective comes from Om Malik in Apple + AI: What to Expect at WWDC 2024.

Natasha MH has penned a lovely piece about the lives we cherish and the ones taken from us with Weeping For Relationships Made Out of Dreams and Denials. There have been lots of dreams and denials dashed in this last decade. Some very personal and some quite global.

In many ways, Natasha’s piece linked above is a a companion to this David French piece The Day My Old Church Canceled Me Was a Very Sad Day. We’ve gotten far to used to loss and far too accepting of how we’re experiencing so much of it because of the turmoil visited on us by one orange-tinged demagogue. Brenda Wineapple says this is Trump’s Most Dangerous Gift., and that it will never rise to the level of public tragedy. If that’s the case, nothing ever will.

We think it’s all happening to us in the here and now. But while today’s issues are horribly threatening and provoke chatter of Civil War, we’ve had our share of the same from our past. Jon Grinspan takes on a bit of a tour of some long forgotten American history that actually led to our actual Civil War with Long Before the Woke, There Were The Wide Awake.

And as a final Sunday morning palette cleanser check out The 25 Photos that Defined the Modern Age in a piece put together by M.H. Miller, Brendan Embser, Emmanuel Duma, and Lucy McKeon. The pictures are worth thousands of words but the words accompanying the pictures are worth quite a bit as well.

If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.

What’s the Problem with Politically Incorrect AI? These Scores Feel Much Like Most of the News

Politically Incorrect AI? Where’s the problem?

Artificial Intelligence is taking its beatings as it weaves its way into just about anything we think might give us a leg up. Recent misfires from Google and Microsoft after big announcements shed light on just how, to this point, reliably unreliable your AI of choice can be. On one hand it’s entertaining. On the other it’s concerning. If there was a third hand I think it would shake towards irony.

MSNBC ran a recent report highlighting inaccuracy scores when AI chatbots were asked political questions and came up with an average of 27% incorrect responses.

It seems to me that a 27% inaccuracy rate is probably within the ballpark of what we hear on any normal day from traditional news sources, social media, and folks sitting at the counter at the local diner. While there are certainly problems, it feels much like AI is doing what it’s designed to do: spit back the nonsense we feed it and it feeds on.

Frankly, I don’t think humans can design any piece of software that will outstrip our human capacity for ignorance that gobbles up the increasingly large amounts of garbage already available. As long as folks can make money from feeding us the fake alongside the real the churn will continue.

Addendum: After posting this I noticed this article in my feeds:

Google and Microsoft’s AI Chatbots Refuse To Say Who Won The 2020 US Election. I guess not answering is one way to avoid an inaccurate answer.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. You can also find me on most social media using my name.

WWDC 2024: iCloudy Forecasts Ahead Amidst Dampening Expectations

iCloudy Forecast Ahead for Apple at WWDC

Here it comes. Apple is heading into its annual World Wide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) with announcements of its next big things beginning June 10th. By all accounts, this year those next big things will center on AI which is short for Artificial Intelligence. There won’t be any shortage of AI in a tech world that has grown both AI crazy and AI fearful, putting Apple is in the unusual position of playing follow the leader in more obvious ways than in the past.

There will be other new features announced for iPhones, Macs, Apple Watches, perhaps even the Vision Pro, but as always the focus will be on what’s new. Even though a goodly portion of what’s new and exciting each year often ends up being a bit “meh” in the end. Either “meh” or rolled out and forgotten as Apple shifts its attention to what next year’s next big things will be. That seems to be what’s happening this year as Apple has turned most of its focus to AI.

Apple is also unfortunately positioned to have to work harder in making its splashy announcements splashy and dodging seemingly already diminished expectations on a number of fronts. Most anticipate Apple’s AI announcements to be less than sexy and the iPad faithful/hopeful seemed to be poised to continue piling on the criticism (some necessary, some not) that greeted newer iPads less than a month ago.

So, on two big fronts, AI and iPadOS, Apple has some tougher challenges ahead than it usually does this time of year. And bad timing is at the root of both.

The iPad Issue Is Touchy

On the iPad front, for whatever reason Apple went more than a year before releasing new iPads. When they did debut them last month they surprised everyone by including new M4 chips in the new Pro lineup, upsetting every pundit’s attempts at trying to assign a predictable timetable to the continued Apple Silicon evolution. Coming just weeks ahead of WWDC, and without any new operating system software to accompany it, Apple opened up a slew of doors for the salivating pundit class to rush through, cranking up the complaints about iPadOS not taking advantage of very powerful and much loved hardware. And, as always, the married at the hip debates about being able to run macOS on an iPad or adding a touch screen to the Mac tagged along as noisy bridesmaids.

It’s a bit frustrating for a regular and religious iPad user. While the issues are genuine, they negatively dominate the conversation given that they come from the influential voices that helped turn the iPad into a success in the first place. I know the issues are long simmering, well intentioned, and come from the heart of those who love the device, but the recent sudden crescendo was deafening enough to fire up a Loud Environment warning on an Apple Watch. With WWDC just around the corner everyone knew the new devices alone were not going to offer anything remotely close to a new and different iPad experience. It just seemed premature to me. If they were meant as a warning to Apple, then I would call it not only premature, but a misfire given the timing.

Those debates and complaints probably aren’t going to end in the foreseeable future as entertaining and exhausting as they can be. Between manifestos, and well thought through lists of what some desire on iPads, there was some general vitriolic piling on. It heralds a tough year ahead for Apple and its iPad lineup.

My prediction is that no one is going to be remotely satisfied with this year’s iPadOS release. Most rumors say not much of consequence will be announced. It’s certainly going to be interesting to follow the commentariat class as they wrestle with how many different ways they can say the iPads are great devices but Apple keeps holding them back for another year.

Perhaps this year changes things, but typically big OS changes come to the iPhone first with iPads and Macs bringing up the rear in the year or years that follow. Given Apple’s push into AI as this year’s big iPhone tent pole, if the iPad doesn’t get included it will add even more to those complaints and increase the volume.

Sunday Morning Reading

Secret octopi, culture wars, convictions, and reading between the letters. In this week’s Sunday Morning Reading.

Life is beginning to settle in after the big move, although there’s parts of it we still can’t figure out which box we packed some of it in. Perhaps we need some sort of A.I. bot to help us figure that out. But we’ll get there. In the meantime here’s some Sunday Morning Reading to share.

Speaking of AI, WTF is AI? That’s the question posed with some attempted answers by Devin Coldeway. It’s a decent primer on the topic. Watch out for secret ocotopi.

A couple of pieces on AI from Nico Grant at the NY Times shows just how unknown and perhaps reliably unreliable this fast evolving tech territory is. First up is Google’s A.I. Search Leaves Publishers Scrambling. Follow that up with Google Rolls Back A.I. Search Feature After Flubs and Flaws. I wonder how AI will spit all of this back at us once articles like these are trained in. I also wonder when publishers will start to standardize whether or not we’ll write it as AI or A.I.

Some think The AI Revolution Is Already Losing Steam. I happened to agree with Christopher Mims, the author of this piece.

Even in the midst of moving it’s been tough to ignore the political comings, goings and convictions in the news. Check out David Todd MCCarty on Bedtime for Bonzo, Or Nothing To See Here. Even after 34 convictions for the orange dude, this piece holds up.

This piece from July of 2021 by John Pavlovitz resurfaced in my feeds in the last week. The Sadness of Sharing A Country With Trump Supporters is worth a re-read in the wake of this week’s news. Somehow I think it will remain relevant for quite some time.

With all that is going on in the political world, it’s a good idea to always remember there is so much more going on behind the scenes than we ever want to realize. Check out Ken Silverstein’s look behind the curtain in Off Leash: Inside The Secret, Global, Far-Right Group Chat. You might be sorry you did.

I hope The Wonkette is writing you visit often. There’s an excellent serial novel there called The Split by Ellis Weiner and Steve Radlauer. It’s up to Chapter 30. It’s terrific and worth your time.

There’s a new book worth highlighting and highlighted by Laura Colliins-Hughes in the NY Times. James Shapiro’s The Playbook chronicles the history of The Federal Theatre Project. The subtitle teases well: A Story of Theatre, Democracy and The Making Of A Culture War. A great story from back in the day when live theatre was actually something folks believed was dangerous enough that it could change minds.

And to close out this week’s edition check out Natasha MH’s Writing The Unpretentious Prose. Don’t just read the words. Look between the letters.

But the Demos Aren’t Lying

Steven Levy has seen enough AI demos to think we should believe the hype. I’m still in wait and see mode.

Call me curious. Call me skeptical. Two sides of the same coin. The tech industry is dancing on the edge of a coin called Artificial Intelligence waiting to see which side lands face up. As they dance, we also dance, because the promise/hope/hype/hyperbole is that the technology will make lives better, fill lots of coffers, and set us all free (except for that sure to increase every year subscription price) to enjoy more of life.

Artificial intelligence new technology science futuristic abstract human brain ai technology cpu central processor unit chipset big data machine learning cyber mind domination generative ai scaled 1 2048x1366.

Steven Levy has apparently seen enough demos that he has penned a piece telling us that It’s Time to Believe the AI Hype. It’s a well reasoned piece, as usual from Levy, and worth a read if you’re trying to follow what all of this means. But the moment that caught me was this quote:

Skeptics might try to claim that this is an industry-wide delusion, fueled by the prospect of massive profits. But the demos aren’t lying.

“But the demos aren’t lying.” They may not be. It all might come true. Or some of it. Or enough of it to matter. Even so, I’ve been around enough blocks too many times to stake anything on any demo for any product. Some do pan out. Too many do not. Given the pace of things in tech these days, I’m guessing that once the inevitable explosion yields to the equally inevitable contraction, there’s a better than average chance that we’ll be eyeing some other piece of universe altering tech within a year or two.

The reality is what’s coming in AI is coming. We’ll all get a taste. The proof wil be in how we digest whatever tech related nutrional value it offers.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.

What Happens to Ads with AI Summaries of Web Pages?

Will AI summarize web ads into submission?

Artificial Intelligence is still the dominate tech craze of the moment. Big announcements are expected within the next several weeks from Apple, Google and just about anyone else who can prompt an AI generated press release into being. I’m sure AI will continue to be on the tips of most digital tongues.

Or will it all just be summarized?

One of the trends I’m seeing predicted is how users will take advantage of Artificial Intelligence to summarize web pages. That sounds like a useful, perhaps noble idea but it raises questions. The web relies so much on advertising to generate revenue. AI is supposed to help ad creators and marketers do better and more efficient designing and targeting. What happens when users stop visiting web pages and just rely on summaries? That’s a genuine question I have and would love to read some possible answers.

It’s not that I’m a big fan of ads, but I remember back in the heyday of RSS that there was all sorts of tension regarding losing ad impressions between web publishers and web users that relied on RSS readers. Then RSS feeds of web articles got truncated into teasers to send users clicking. Then ads got inserted into RSS. Will the same thing happen with ads being inserted into AI summaries? How would that work with something like an AI Pin or the Rabbit R1? (Although I doubt those devices will be around for us to find out.)

Given that one of the other predicted AI trends is being able to verbally converse with whatever AI machine you choose, how would that work with advertising? Will a user need to listen to ads before getting a response to their prompt? There’s already a lag in compute capacity resulting in delays delivering responses to queries with most current AI engines. I don’t imagine waiting for an ad insertion will help improve on that.

Again, these are sincere questions that I’d love to hear some thoughts on. Just don’t summarize them.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.

Sunday Morning Reading

Some serious stuff in our world this week, but we must dance on. Here’s some Sunday Morning Reading to share.

The world is a very serious and uncomfortable place based on what I’ve been reading this past week, so the topics for this edition of Sunday Morning Reading will lean that way. Good writing all around that meets the seriousness we’re all dancing around.

The United States Supreme Court is about to alter the world we’ve all thought we’ve lived in. Rick Wilson of Everything Trump Touches Dies fame writes:

“The Supreme Court will delay Trump’s case and then make the most cataclysmic legal mistake in American history.

We’re not talking Dred Scott bad, Plessy bad, and Korematsu bad.

We’re talking about previously unimagined levels of bad.”

He’s correct. Check out The Red Court Strikes Again.

Bryan Tannehill says The Court Just Sealed Everyone’s Fate, Including It’s Own. Again, correct.

While this may be a bit less current than most articles inlcuded this week, Brian Gopnik reminds us that it takes more than one man to turn the world upside down in The Forgotten History of Hitler’s Establishment Enablers.

Wars, protests and political shenanigans about those wars abound. Mo Husseni has laid out his thoughts about what’s happening in the Middle East and our reactions to it on Threads and published them as an essay on Medium. Well worth your time to read his piece titled Hmmm… do I need a title?

A few topics on the tech front, the mechanism that one way or the other bring us all this news and writing about that news, Edward Zitron tells us about The Man Who Killed Google Search.

Craig Grannell tells us to Just Say No: Not Every Piece of Tech Needs Subscriptons and AI. He’s correct and he nails the reason why this is becoming pervasive.

I don’t agree with everything Allison Johnson says in The Walls of Apple’s Garden Are Tumbling Down, but she makes good points and provides a piece of the necessary frame around this unfolding story.

Changing the subject, it is tough to laugh given all that is swirling around us. But laugher is crucial. Always. As unprovoked a release of emotion it is, laughter does take on different forms and come from different places. Christie Nicholson takes on The Humor Gap between men and women. Hat tip to David Todd McCarty for this excellent piece.

A Summer Place by Natasha MH reminds us that whatever we’re mired in, we should always dance on and quoting Neil Gaiman we should

Face Your life

It’s pain,

It’s pleasure,

Leave no path untaken.

Sunday Morning Reading

Silver linings, taking stock, a revival of the Avant-Garde, and the future of chocolate all in this week’s Sunday Morning Reading to Share

Weekends used to be for taking a breath. That seems so long ago it’s tough to measure it conventionally as it somehow sadly just slipped away. Even so, there’s still time to share some Sunday Morning Reading.

Artificial Intelligence remains on the tip of all the digital tongues these days, though it’s yet to show any real promise that I’ve seen. Except for those who got in early on the cash grab. Steven Levy has an interesting piece, Tech Leaders Once Cried For AI Regulation. Now the Message is ‘Slow Down.’ Sounds like the cash isn’t as easy to grab as much as it used to be.

Speaking of AI, Chris Castle has an interesting piece on Music Technology Policy called Has The Ship Sailed On The Myth of “Responsible AI”? I’m not even sure it ever qualified for myth status, but whatever it is, that ship is out of the harbor. Hat Tip to Stan Stewart.

Kyle Chayka thinks The Dumbphone Is Real. This comes as so many blame smartphones for the decline of civilization among other smaller sins. Call me when every company in the world no longer begs you to pay your bills online, you can reach your doctor’s office via a phone, or tech companies (including those that make dumb phones don’t put you through hell trying to get techncial support from a person. I’ll take that call on my smartphone.

Most things get recycled. Including art movements. Helen Shaw takes a look at one such revival/remount in The Avant-Garfde Is Back On The Launchpad about the Wooster Group’s remounting of Richard Foreman’s Symphony of Rats.

Jamelle Bouie’s When Politicians Invoke the Founding Fathers, Remember This is interesting. First, because the title changed from when it first appeared in The New York Times. Originally it was The Founding Fathers Don’t Have the Answers To Every Question. I wrote about that here. My points remain, so does Bouie’s (which are excellent). The headline writing still suffers.

Richard Stengel suggests that 2024 election coverage should be free and out from behind paywalls. He makes a good argument in Democracy Dies Behind Paywalls.

One of my favorite writers, NatashaMH gets quite poignant and, protestations aside, quite brave in doing so, in The Distance Between a Breath And Sadness. I think we should all learn how to better measure that distance.

David Todd McCarty uncharacteristically goes Searching for Silver Linings.

And to close things out on a bitter sweet note, Isable Fattal takes a look at The Future of Chocolate. It’s a summary for articles about the future of chocolate as she tells us to savor our favorites whlle we can. Apparently, yet another in a long line of sweet life things where we need to measure the difference between a breath and sadness because there may not be a silver lining.