Don’t judge Apple Intelligence by today’s recaps: smartphone AI will be great… eventually
It wasn’t a great year for smartphone AI. While AI technology has advanced by leaps and bounds behind the scenes, the actual AI products we get to use seem less useful than ever. Even though AI calculations make the best camera phones fantastic, we feel like we are exposed to more bad AI than good AI. I’m here to offer a ray of sunshine through the cloud! AI will be very good for mobile devices. It’s going to make everything so much easier that you’ll never even think about having AI on your phone again.
Before then, AI will have to overcome its bad reputation. As I will explain, AI will be everything, but we are not there yet. I don’t think the current situation is due to an AI error. I blame humans, not AI. I have high hopes for AI. I predict that in a few years it will be an inseparable part of mobile computing. You won’t consider buying a phone without it.
Current AI isn’t even version 1.0. The features we have today – generative AI for image creation and text, live chat agents – not that the AI, but rather the tools that will build AI. These are not finished products. They are not products at all, they are tricks that the emerging AI systems can perform on the way to functionality.
Today’s AI makes me wonder, “Why do we need this?”
I can’t write an email or text without my AI assistant offering to help screw it up
I may be cynical, but look at the AI features we are being force-fed. We get a picture generators full of stereotypescopyright violations and the potential for fraud and violence. We get language models that provide incorrect facts and incorrect summaries. Small functions like handwriting recognition and photo lighting effects now rely on cloud computing, consuming unprecedented power and adding steps to the process for minimal usability gain.
Everywhere you look, intrusive AI features are trying too hard. I can’t write an email or text without my AI assistant offering to help screw it up with gobbledygook. In Google Photos offers new AI tools for search for the photos I want, and then return results that are useless compared to the older, AI-less search capabilities.
New AI background tools are ubiquitous, but they create backdrops that are impersonal at best, and they are can be a bit racist at worst. Did we almost run out of wallpaper makers? Why do we even need generative AI for wallpapers?
If these tools were all we could expect from AI, I’d say it’s time to close the project and go home. It’s time to look for what’s next.
I think that will probably be smart glasses, but that’s obvious Smart glasses and any future mobile technology will rely on AI and machine learning to provide a robust experience. That’s why I’m still optimistic about smartphone AI. I have to be optimistic. It’s going to get better, much better.
When AI solves a smartphone problem, it becomes valuable
I don’t think I could change my home screen… without digging through the Settings menu, and I’m a bona fide smartphone expert
Current AI doesn’t solve major problems for users. What’s the biggest problem you have with your phone? The battery runs out too quickly. Okay, AI can help with that, and I can agree with that Qualcomm’s latest AI-forward processors are also the most efficient high-end smartphone processors I’ve ever benchmarked. So, what else?
Smartphones are still too difficult to use. I really want to use all the cool features, but I don’t know how. I know my phone can do a million and one things, including a million things I never use because I don’t know how.
Do you know how to share a photo by tapping your phone against another phone? Do you know how to charge your earbuds with your phone’s battery? Have you ever created a security check-in on the way home at night? I know my phone can do all that, but I need a refresher to figure it out. Honestly, I don’t think I could change my home screen from light mode to dark mode without digging into the Settings menu, and I’m a bona fide smartphone expert.
AI will solve this problem. I don’t need to know if it’s ‘Reverse Wireless Charging’ on my OnePlus versus ‘PowerShare’ on my Galaxy versus USB-C Power Delivery with my iPhone. I just tell my phone’s AI what I want to do and it turns on the wireless power to charge my Galaxy Buds.
I don’t need to know that the iPhone hides the security check-in feature under iMessagewhile Google hides the same feature in the little known Safety app. I just tell my phone, “Let my dad know when I get home safely,” and it does the rest.
In the future, your smartphone’s AI will form the entire interface
The current crop of AI features are parlor tricks. Watch me pour beer from this bottle without picking it up! Bet I can’t fit Mickey Mouse in our group photo! Watch me compose a message using AI, without any thought! Okay, nice, but that’s not something I want to do every day, or maybe even more than once.
Fortunately, that is not the future for AI. In the near future, we will be interacting with what Qualcomm and other tech companies call AI agents. Think of Siri, Gemini and Bixby, but more capable and understanding. The AI will be the interface. You can swipe or open apps, but you don’t have to. Just tell the phone what you want and don’t worry about the AI. If AI finally makes our smartphones’ lives easier instead of more complicated, it will be great.