A new report from The Information reveals significant internal turmoil behind Apple’s attempts to revamp Siri. According to a post by Hartley Charlton for Macrumors, Apple’s AI team repeatedly changed direction on the technical approach for Apple Intelligence, starting with plans for dual language models before pivoting to a single cloud-based solution.
The report highlights how conflicting personalities and poor leadership contributed to Siri’s problems. Former employees described an “overly relaxed culture” and “lack of ambition” within Apple’s AI group, which has been mockingly dubbed “AIMLess” internally. Staff reportedly refer to Siri as a “hot potato” passed between teams without meaningful improvements.
John Giannandrea, Apple’s AI chief, downplayed the significance of ChatGPT in 2022, while Siri leader Robby Walker focused on minor improvements like removing “hey” from the “hey Siri” command, a project that took over two years to complete.
Particularly concerning were revelations about Apple’s WWDC 2024 demonstration of Apple Intelligence. The report claims the impressive showcase where Siri accessed emails for flight data and integrated with Maps was “effectively fictitious,” surprising even members of the Siri team who had never seen working versions of these capabilities.
Some employees remain optimistic about Siri’s future under Craig Federighi and Mike Rockwell. Federighi has reportedly instructed engineers to do “whatever it takes to build the best AI features,” including potentially using open-source models from other companies instead of relying solely on Apple’s technology.