Steve Wozniak, the tech engineer and programmer who co-founded Apple with Steve Jobs, shared his candid thoughts on the artificial intelligence (AI) announcements at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference in a recent Bloomberg interview.
“I’m very interested in the Apple intelligence though,” Wozniak stated, referring to Apple’s new AI tools. However, he expressed reservations: “I’m afraid of whenever it’s some kind of AI speaking for me. I want to be myself and I want to be the one speaking.”
Wozniak was both impressed by the new AI demos but skeptical about their real-world performance.
“The demos today were pretty much you had a choice to circle some little area and let it go and do its magical wonders or rewrite something,” he said. “But I still believe strongly you should try it and find out after it’s over. You know what works, what doesn’t?”
He hopes the new AI can save time on everyday tasks.
“There were so many things I saw today that said, oh, my gosh, if that works, that’s going to save me a lot of time,” said Wozniak. “Just trying to get my own things done, communicate with my friends or whatever, you know, write emails, write texts.”
Wozniak longs for AI that truly understands context like a “Knowledge Navigator.” Referencing an old Apple ad, he said the original Siri dream was to “understand everything about you and notify you of things that were on your schedule and what you should buy and where.”
While intrigued by Apple’s AI advances, the Woz voices the everyman’s cautious optimism about cutting-edge technology — let’s see if it really works as promised.
Featured image: Credit: Bloomberg
