How Apple’s Revamped AI Could Center on Wearables
Every tech company seems to be flirting with wearable AI gadgets, but how they take shape is all over the map. The glasses are here with Meta and soon Googlewhile The OpenAI hardware project with Jony Ive still remains a mystery. Apple, for its part, could also free glasses. Or maybe not.
A new report from The Information indicates that Apple work on a small pin the size of an AirTag that would have its own camera and function as an AI wearable. For what? Right now, Apple doesn’t have anywhere else to put an outward-facing camera. Cameras are the key part of any AI service that wants to not only respond to your voice, but also give you information about what you see in the room.
Humane’s AI Pin was a failed product, but the first to really try to be a used alternative to AI glasses.
Could a pin be a stepping stone to glasses?
Cameras are a big part of the reason for the growing popularity of AI glasses. It’s relatively easy to place a camera in an eyeglass frame near your eyes and have it work with AI to recognize the objects it sees and offer advice and information. A pin or pendant allows the AI to “see” the world without you having to wear a pair of glasses. Many companies have already tried thator I try again, with and without cameras.
In my opinion, Apple’s collective wearable hardware ecosystem gives it an advantage over competing AI wearable devices. Take AirPods, for example.
Multiple reports indicate new AirPods Pro models will arrive this year with infrared cameras who can recognize hand gestures. For regular AirPods use, this seems excessive. But to interact with AI? Maybe that’s right, especially if gesture commands come that could mimic what Meta does with his neural bracelet. And if combined with a camera-equipped pin, maybe the whole thing could work as a display-less experience, so no need for smart glasses.
I think I’d just prefer good glasses that do all that, but that’s the problem: It’s not easy to do right now, and the battery life of smart glasses is still typically less than a full day. However, Apple could be aiming for smart glasses with built-in displays, which would be a sort of next evolutionary step to what they’ve already established. VisionPro. For that, the glasses may have to wait a little longer.
Meta’s Ray-Bans (top) sit on top of a Vision Pro (bottom). Apple doesn’t have glasses yet, but they have headphones and watches and plenty of gesture control capabilities.
How many Apple products will be interconnected with AI? And when?
In the next few years, gesture-enabled AirPods, gesture-enabled AirPods Apple Watches (which already supports faucets and wrist tremors) and wearable devices like camera-equipped pins could begin to lay the foundation for glasses or as an accompaniment. The question is how useful they will actually be.
I’m as excited about future technologies as anyone you’ll meet, but I don’t want to wear an AI pin. I’ve done it before and I don’t like the idea of doing it again. Perhaps Apple needs to work with its competitors on AI to make its wearable devices compelling.
AI partnership between Apple and Googlebuilt from Gemini, highlights the advances in AI that could soon affect Apple products. A report from Mark Gurman at Bloomberg indicates that Siri will be rebuilt as a generative AI chatbot. Gemini can already do a lot of live, camera-assisted AI that Google and Samsung will use on a new wave of smart glasses this year. Apple could do the same and even integrate this AI awareness into its Vision Pro headset.
When I see news about an AI Pin, I see it as just one piece of a hardware puzzle that includes AirPods and Watches — Apple accessories working together. A pin would be one more thing to carry around, sure, but at least it would be cheaper than glasses and avoid any need to find prescription assistance.
Regardless, this flagged pin isn’t supposed to arrive here until 2027. Apple could show an early preview this year, much like they’ve done for future products like Vision Pro, Apple Watch, and HomePod in the past.
What I’m watching is all of Apple’s planned AI evolution, which may finally happen after the disappointing launch of Apple Intelligence. I’ve yet to see camera-enabled AI services really impress me on glasses, but the potential is clearly there. Apple also seems ready to get into this game soon, whether it’s on our faces, pinned to our shirts or who knows where else. But then they have to figure out how to better design what exactly we would use this camera-enabled AI for in the first place.
