By John Moltz
December 6, 2024 2:00 PM PT
This Week in Apple: Who’s asking?
Tim Cook sits down for another interview (two more and he gets a free set of steak knives), Apple and Spotify take a look at your taste in music, and changes are coming to how iPhones handle memory, all for AI.
More time with Tim
If you’ve ever wanted get into it with Tim Cook about AI, this week there was an interview for you.
“Tim Cook Wants Apple to Literally Save Your Life”
Please.
Writing for Wired, Steven Levy asked Cook about Apple’s awkward Apple Intelligence ads and his own comments about its features.
I’ve heard you say that Apple Intelligence could make you funnier, which seems strange.
I think it can make you friendlier, which, in many ways, can be funnier as well.
Well… no. But, OK.
Turns out if Tim doesn’t like a question, he just doesn’t answer it.
If AGI does actually happen, how would that affect Apple?
That’s a discussion that we’ll continue to have.
Tim, can you tell us your fundamental message for our times, that encapsulates the meaning of existence and holds the secrets to reinforcing the connection that holds the human race together?
My fundamental belief is, if you’re looking at your phone more than you’re looking in somebody’s eyes, that’s a problem.
Beautiful.
Questionable tastes on display
Apple released its annual Apple Music Replay this week and people were gleefully sharing their results. It used to be that no one would know what your poor choices in music were. Now people put it out there for everyone to see. What a time to be alive. Thank god these features weren’t around when the Spin Doctors were popular.
Apple Music Replay 1992: “You listened to ‘Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong’ four thousand three hun-… oh, my god, is that right? Seriously? These numbers are going to come back and haunt you, you know.”
Spotify also released its annual music review, Spotify Wrapped, leading to a bit of comparison between the two services. While Replay on iOS finally keeps you in the app (in a web view), Replay in Music on the Mac kicks you out to the web. Spotify, meanwhile, included an AI podcast instead of other features users have found fun in the past.
The result is meant to feel like you’re listening to a podcast about your Wrapped.
“Area Grown-Assed Man Listens to a Surprising Number of Superhero Movie Soundtracks.” Thanks, but no thanks.
This surely had nothing to do with the fact that Spotify cut 2,300 jobs last year.
When asked for comment on how it decided what to include in Wrapped this year, Spotify simply said, “Every year we look to bring a new and exciting experience to Wrapped for listeners. It’s part of the secret sauce of Wrapped.”
Did an AI write that response?
Dubious features
You know the old saying: “It’s not a feature it’s a… actually, I don’t know what this is.”
“Apple Looking to Fundamentally Change iPhone Memory Design to Enhance AI Performance”
The shift will mark a departure from the current package-on-package (PoP) method, where the low-power double data rate (LPDDR) DRAM is stacked directly on the System-on-Chip (SoC).
Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Sure. I was gonna suggest that. LPDDR. PoPping and SoCking.
Now, there might be a downside.
It may also use more power and increase latency.
All so we can walk faster through the uncanny valley of Image Playground. OK.
All that work for AI is still not as little requested as this:
“You can buy Bitcoin with Apple Pay via new Coinbase rollout”
Now you can convert your real money to fake money right from your iPhone!
That’s great and all but can I buy Hawk Tuah meme coin with Apple Pay? (If you don’t know what Hawk Tuah is, do not type it into your favorite search engine. Or anything.) Probably just as well that you can’t as — gasp! — it seems to be a bit of a pyramid scheme!
“‘Hawk Tuah’ Girl Launched Her Own Crypto Coin That Became Worthless In Minutes”
People lost money investing in a scamming crypto currency pushed by a shameless self-promoter? Now I’ve seen everything.
Angry investorvictims have taken to the dumpster fire formerly known as Twitter to attempt to get their money back.
Good. Luck. With. That.
What’s the world coming to when you can’t trust a person who got famous for saying [WHAT SHE GOT FAMOUS FOR SAYING REDACTED] with your money?
[John Moltz is a Six Colors contributor. You can find him on Mastodon at Mastodon.social/@moltz and he sells items with references you might get on Cotton Bureau.]