Apple Intelligence Gets Major Update as Company Addresses AI Gaps - 2025-09-09

Apple's gradual Apple Intelligence rollout continues with today's announcement of Visual Intelligence and enhanced Live Translation capabilities. The company is taking their sweet time with AI, and this slow bullshit lets competitors who launched similar features years ago eat their lunch.

Visual Intelligence: Apple's Take on Object Recognition

Apple's Visual Intelligence brings image recognition capabilities to iPhones, similar to Google Lens which launched in 2017. The main difference is Apple's on-device processing approach - better for privacy, though potentially limited by iPhone hardware constraints.

Google Lens has had years to refine its cloud-based recognition system. Apple's version launches later this year with on-device processing, which should work without internet but may have accuracy trade-offs compared to cloud-based alternatives.

Live Translation: Offline-First Approach

Apple's Live Translation focuses on offline functionality across Messages, FaceTime, and Phone calls. While Google Translate has offered real-time translation for years, Apple's approach prioritizes privacy by keeping translation processing on-device.

The offline capability addresses a legitimate need - translation without internet connectivity. However, Apple's initial release supports limited language pairs, and on-device models typically have accuracy limitations compared to cloud-based systems that benefit from larger datasets and more processing power.

Siri Improvements Still Delayed

Apple continues working on major Siri improvements, though the enhanced version remains in development. The company has acknowledged that current Siri capabilities lag behind user expectations, particularly for conversational AI interactions.

Apple executives have stated that significant Siri upgrades need additional development time to meet their quality standards. Meanwhile, OpenAI shipped working conversational AI in ChatGPT back in 2022 while Apple was still figuring out what AI even means.

Competitive Pressure Mounts

Apple's slow-ass AI rollout is getting them destroyed by competitors. Google Assistant and Alexa have maintained stronger conversational capabilities, while newer AI assistants continue advancing.

Reports suggest Apple has considered partnerships, including potentially integrating Google's Gemini AI to enhance Siri capabilities. This would be a huge "fuck it, we give up" moment for Apple, who usually insists on building everything themselves, but maybe they finally realized their AI is garbage.

Developer Framework Limitations

Apple's Foundation Models framework provides developers access to on-device AI capabilities, emphasizing privacy and offline functionality. However, this approach is fucking limited - on-device models are typically smaller and less capable than cloud-based alternatives.

The offline thing sounds cool until you realize it means your AI is dumber than a cloud-based model from 2022. Most developers just use OpenAI or Google APIs because they actually work, even if it means sending data to the cloud.

Apple finally decided to join the AI party, three years after everyone else. Their small-model, on-device processing approach combined with Private Cloud Compute is actually pretty clever - when it works.

The On-Device Processing Thing Actually Makes Sense

Look, I hate giving Apple credit for anything, but running AI locally instead of sending everything to the cloud isn't completely stupid:

Privacy: Your embarrassing text messages stay on your phone instead of getting fed to some LLM training set. About fucking time.

Speed: No waiting for shitty cell towers when you want to summarize an email. Works instantly when your Wi-Fi decides to take a break.

Offline: Unlike every other AI assistant that becomes braindead without internet, this might actually work on a plane.

Cost: Apple doesn't have to pay for millions of ChatGPT API calls every time someone asks Siri to set a timer. Smart business move disguised as a feature.

The Planned Obsolescence Bullshit Strikes Again

Apple Intelligence needs A17 Pro chips or Apple Silicon to work. Translation: time to buy a new fucking phone.

What actually works:

• iPhone 16 models (of course the newest ones work)
• iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max (base iPhone 15? Go fuck yourself)
• iPad Pro with M1 or newer
• iPad Air with M1 or newer
• Macs with Apple Silicon

Your perfectly functional iPhone 15 can run Call of Duty but somehow can't handle text summarization? It's planned obsolescence disguised as "computational intensity." The iPhone 15 Pro has the same neural engine as the base model - they just flip a software switch.

Why Apple's "Integration" Strategy Is Annoying as Hell

Instead of building a proper AI assistant, Apple decided to sprinkle AI dust across all their apps. Cool concept, shitty execution:

Writing Tools: Works in Mail, Messages, and Pages. Except when it doesn't. Third-party app support is basically nonexistent because Apple's APIs are dogshit.

Image Generation: Genmoji is cute for about five minutes. Image Playground creates the kind of generic clipart that makes your eyes bleed.

Siri: Still can't understand basic requests half the time, but now it fails with more confidence.

The problem? You can't just open "Apple AI" and use it like ChatGPT. Everything's buried in menus and context actions that nobody knows exist.

How Far Behind Apple Really Is

Let's be honest about where Apple stands:

Conversational AI: ChatGPT runs circles around Siri. It's embarrassing how much better OpenAI is at this.

Developer Tools: OpenAI has APIs that actually work. Apple has documentation that was clearly written by someone who's never used their own framework.

User Adoption: Nobody talks about Apple Intelligence because nobody can find it. At least people know where to download ChatGPT.

Enterprise: Why would businesses use Apple's half-baked AI when Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 have had working AI features for years?

Apple Finally Admits They Can't Build AI

ChatGPT integration is Apple waving the white flag. They basically admitted their AI is shit by letting you use OpenAI's instead. They're also planning to add Google Gemini because why not make it even more confusing.

So now you'll have Apple's mediocre AI, ChatGPT, Google's AI, and probably Claude soon. Which one handles your request? Who fucking knows! It'll be like having four different virtual assistants that don't talk to each other.

The privacy angle is hilarious too. Apple spent years telling us they don't send data to third parties, then immediately partnered with OpenAI and Google. "Privacy" until it gets in the way of actually working features.

This whole strategy screams "we have no idea what we're doing but maybe someone else does." Classic Apple: take credit for other people's work and pretend it was the plan all along.