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>>"As of today’s launch, companies like Apple, Twitter, Intel and Baidu are missing from the group. Though Apple is said to be enthusiastic about the project, t
by gavman 10y ago
>>"As of today’s launch, companies like Apple, Twitter, Intel and Baidu are missing from the group. Though Apple is said to be enthusiastic about the project, their absence is still notable because the company has fallen behind in artificial intelligence when compared to its rivals — many of which are part of this new group."
It seems Apple's lack of engagement in the community [1] is really starting to hurt it. Did anyone else take away from this that the other big players are not including them at the table/considering them real competition?
[1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-29/apple-s-secrecy-hurts-its-ai-software-development http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-29/apple-s-se...
- theDoug 10y agoNo.
- debt 10y agoapple isn't hurt by this at all. they likely don't want to commit any resources beyond a spokesperson mentioning that their enthusiastic about it. this partnership thing is a pr move that makes all involved look good. investors and shareholders alike thinkin "cool they're working on ai, that's good" what will come of the partnership? nothing other than a place journalists can ping for questions about ai.
- flamedoge 10y agoAs tradition, Apple will come in mid-hype and do it "right"
- duaneb 10y agoAI is by nature abstract. Once it's not abstract, there is typically a more useful term for it: classification, recognition, search, etc etc. What do you mean by doing AI right? Apple's track record with doing something right applies to product lines, not their technology.
- j1vms 10y agoWhether right or wrong, I think it's good to keep in mind that Apple has, by far the highest quarterly profit and total asset value, compared to any of these companies - it really is a giant among giants. Alphabet certainly has an excellent future outlook (reflected in the markets), but its current financial state still pales in comparison to Apple. Taking this into account, I figure Apple thinks twice and thrice before joining industry consortiums and partnerships that they didn't initiate themselves. This would be straightforward posturing/strategizing on their part, and probably doesn't reveal too much about the current state of their R&D in Machine Learning. It's unfortunate that things are this way, but nothing unusual from a "game theory" perspective.
- altcognito 10y agoI also don't think of them as a straight technology company, but more of a best of breed product company focused on a great user experience. In that sense, high risk, long term investments that don't have an immediate application don't fit their profile.
- princeb 10y ago> best of breed product company focused on a great user experience somehow i put them in the same category as LG, Samsung and Sony, albeit 100x better at what they do.
- matt_wulfeck 10y agoApple's fastest growing revenue stream is services. It's already a 20 billion a year profit machine.
- jordan_litko 10y agoCan you give more information on this? I had no idea they had such a potent revenue stream in the services sector.
- 10y ago
- tomnipotent 10y agoWhy are you surprised that Apple isn't involved in a field that has no material impact on their business? Outside of Siri and related projects, I don't see where AI/machine learning has any immediate benefits. Twitter and Intel missing seems like something to take note of, but I didn't even think twice about Apple. I'm more surprised GE is missing than Apple.
- ENGNR 10y agoI use Android, but Apple are doing some good personal assistant stuff like tagging friends in photos, -without- uploading them to the cloud. A true personal assistant that can use machine learning locally and with discretion sounds pretty great
- mschwaig 10y agoI'm really starting to appreciate this kind of thing about Apple. They seem to be concerned about keeping data in the hands of their users as much as possible, when the rest of the industry defaults to a cloud-hosted solution that requires the user to completely give up control.
- wstrange 10y agoThat's a nifty feature, but I am sceptical that Apple can offer the same kind of experience when compared to cloud-based solutions that leverage massive amounts of aggregated data and backend processing. Apple has made a pretty big deal about privacy, but they do collect user data (see the interview a few weeks ago with Apple's mapping lead -saying they are collecting user data to improve maps). Ultimately if users want ultra smart AI assistants (Siri, Google Now, Cortana, etc.) they will need to give up some of their data. That may be very unpopular with the HN crowd, but I suspect the vast majority of consumers will be OK with that tradeoff.
- mschwaig 10y agoApple also works on technology that is meant to help users give up less of their privacy. They talked about this at WWDC 2016 under the headline 'Differential Privacy'. They're trying to use statistics to make it harder to attribute data points to individuals while still providing a workable data set on the collective of users. Here's an article about that: https://www.wired.com/2016/06/apples-differential-privacy-collecting-data/ https://www.wired.com/2016/06/apples-differential-privacy-co...
- sqldba 10y agoIt's just FUD. This whole thing is a boorish marketing exercise about throwing money about and which will go nowhere. That's why Apple is out. It doesn't waste it's money.
- supercoder 10y agoHurt it how ?
- blazespin 10y agoLikely this is part of why this group was created. They were probably getting tired of Apple trying to ride on everyone's hard work without giving anything back.
- preek 10y agoWhat's the basis of this argument?
- AJ007 10y agoI see a list of companies which are ethically compromised. Apple has publicly taken the opposite side of the fence on this one. I'm not sure they want to be associated with Facebook, Google, Amazon or Microsoft using AI to strip apart user's private behavior and reassemble it as advertising data. Would we trust a cooperative of tobacco companies funding scientific research and ethics surrounding the use and promotion of cigarettes? Does anyone contest that Facebook's AI is going to pull apart their user's public social feeds and private FB conversations to advance their own business model? A unification of a large group of tech companies could even be seen as an anti-OpenAI. A singleton could certainly emerge as a co-operation between multiple large corporations and/or a government. An Amazon & Google partnership is particularly terrifying considering how much computing power could be rolled over to a unified AI almost instantaneously. We do not need an organization engaged in PR for for-profit companies attempting to placate the public while lobbying regulators while unleashing their AI on the public at large. That is what this looks like. We've seen their business ethics already. It isn't a good template moving forward. I would be less cynical if I heard anyone else besides Apple taking a public stand on keeping personal data private and AI contained in boxes. There does need to be AI ethics and safety leaders, but Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon should be following not in the lead.
- usgroup 10y agoI think that you sir, are right on the money. An apt analogy with the tobacco industry too.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- danblick 10y agoThere's no conspiracy here. Apple is just not involved in the machine learning community in the same way as these others. Look at NIPS and you'll see activity from all of the other participants in this announcement. Apple isn't present in the same way.
- turingbook 10y agoAs for AI, Apple is a small and outsider player which will hurt in the long term.
- newscracker 10y ago> As for AI, Apple is a small and outsider player which will hurt in the long term. Since you didn't explicitly state whom it will hurt, the devil in me reads this sentence as Apple's involvement (or lack of it) will hurt all people. :)