Apple Really Did Ignore the AI Emergence at WWDC

So far I’ve managed to watch the WWDC Keynote and Platforms State of the Union from this year’s WWDC. At the time, I was amazed that Apple appeared to be ignoring the current massive emergence in generative AI. I figured, well, they’ll dig into that in the deeper sessions later in the week. But sitting here 10 days post event, I’m realizing that in the river of buzz flowing by about WWDC developments, I wasn’t hearing anyone talk, at all, about Apple and AI. I used the Apple Developer app and did a bit of searching—kudos to Apple for having everything transcribed and searchable—and I’ll be damned, they really did ignore the elephant in the room. A few incidental AI mentions, and “generative” appeared once.

The same cook time (no pun intended) allowed me to rethink my original reaction, “Apple’s being clueless!” to a more measured “Ah, yeah, Apple’s being Apple!” Specifically, “If we’re not ready to talk about it, we’re not going out there and throwing half-baked crap against the wall.” In stark contrast to much of the tech world’s half-assed, panicked responses. I bet Apple’s following developments very closely, but waiting to see where it goes and really looking at what it means and how it fits into their world. I also bet Apple’s been doing serious generative AI work since well before it hit the radar last fall with the art AI emergence.

And give Apple credit for parachuting their own elephant into the room, in the form of Vision Pro and visionOS.