The Macalope doesn’t like to complain (LOL). Really, when it comes down to it, being an Apple pundit isn’t a bad gig. Well, the hours are pretty good, anyway.
Lately, however, it seems there are only two big topics in the Apple world and both of them suck. The first is AI. The Macalope agrees (albeit a little grudgingly because of its other, numerous faults) that AI can be a very useful tool, in certain well-defined use cases (like programming). It just has two real problems: companies trying to shove it into literally everything and the fact that it’s simply unreliable. You might get a correct answer out it, but you might not.
Last month, The Verge’s David Pierce lamented that the current hype around AI was “wrecking a whole generation of gadgets”. Companies (cough, Apple, cough) are spinning their wheels trying to AI-ify all their products, adding “features” that no one asked for using a technology no one trusts, rather than working on new features. A plurality of Americans surveyed by Pew Research (PDF) believe that AI will have a negative effect on the U.S. over the next 20 years.
If you ever wonder why AI continues to be pushed relentlessly despite customer indifference or outright disdain, take this example by Shopify’s CEO. AI is seen by CEOs and venture capitalists as a way to lay people off. They would rather burn the Amazon rainforest to the ground, pave it, and put up the world’s biggest Arby’s than hire one more of you ungrateful, needy meat sacks.
Wah-wah, I want health care. Wah-wah, I want a 401k. What about the CEO’s fifth yacht? Did you ever stop to think of that?
If you read the news, you have probably seen reports of how Apple has been burning cycles trying to get AI to improve Siri. The Information provided a behind-the-scenes look at “How Apple Fumbled Siri’s AI Makeover” based on accounts of former Apple employees, who may or may not be gruntled. The New York Times’s Trip Mickle just went with “What’s Wrong With Apple?”. Possibly Mickle was thinking he was cleverly dodging Betteridge’s Law there but, as it turns out, the answer to any Trip Mickle article about Apple is “NO.”, whether the headline is phrased as a question or not.
Well, if you don’t like AI, fear not! There’s another crappy topic hogging the Apple headlines: tariffs. Fun.
The past couple of weeks have been a real rollercoaster of tariff news. Or maybe the tilt-a-whirl is a more accurate ride, where everyone inside the tilt-a-whirl had state fair sushi for lunch and are, uh-oh, suddenly not feelin’ so good.
IDG
First, tariffs were announced, sending markets plummeting because, spoiler alert, they’re a garbage policy that just antagonizes trading partners as well as citizens who suddenly have to pay more for goods. The Trump administration responded quickly, however… by raising said tariffs by, and the Macalope believes this is a direct quote, “Eleventy umpteen percent”.
Pretty sure that’s a direct quote. Maybe someone can check that.
Then, late Friday, good news! Looks like Tim Cook’s $1 million donation did pay off because, oh, did we say tariffs on everything? No, no, not on smartphones. Or laptops. Or hard drives. Processors. Chips. What have you.
Well, that seems like a weirdly specific carve-out designed solely for the benefit of certain CEOs who shoveled money into Trump’s inauguration fund but…okay, good, at least Apple can…
“Tariffs on chips, phones, laptops still coming, commerce secretary warns”
OH, COME ON. The Macalope didn’t even get through the sentence. Gotta start using shorter sentences.
It’s almost like no one knows what they’re doing.
Almost.
The Macalope’s point here is that neither of these topics is fun to cover. The horny one got into tech writing because it was fun to speculation about upcoming products or talk about things that were currently shipping. A technology that’s largely driven by a desire to lay people off and policies that are driven by a meagre understanding of global economic forces are just… sad.
But right now these are the elephants in the room. They’re unavoidable. And that stinks.