AI Applesauce: Sweeten the Story about Muffing the Bunny
August 14, 2025
No AI. Just a dinobaby being a dinobaby.
I read “Apple CEO Tim Cook Calls AI ‘Bigger Than the Internet’ in Rare All-Hands Meeting.” I noted this passage:
In a global all-hands meeting hosted from Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, CEO Tim Cook seemed to admit to what analysts and Apple enthusiasts around the world had been raising concerns about: that Apple has fallen behind competitors in the AI race. And Cook promised employees that the company will be doing everything to catch up. “Apple must do this. Apple will do this. This is sort of ours to grab.” …The AI revolution [is] “as big or bigger” than the internet.
Okay. Two companies of some significance have miss the train to AI Ville: Apple and Telegram. Both have interesting technology. Apple is far larger, but for some users Telegram is more important to their lives. One is fairly interested in China activities; the other is focused on Russia and crypto.
But both have managed their firms into the same digital row boat. Apple had Siri and it was not very good. Telegram knew about AI and allowed third-party bot developers to use it, but Telegram itself dragged its feet.
Both companies are asserting that each has plenty of time. Tim Cook is talking about smart software but so far the evidence of making an AI difference is scant. Telegram, on the other hand, has aimed Nikolai Durov at AI. That wizard is working on a Telegram AI system.
But the key point is that both of these forward leaning outfits are trying to catch up. This is not keeping pace, mind. The two firms are trying to go from watching the train go down the tracks to calling an Uber to get to their respective destinations.
My take on both companies is that the “leadership” have some good reasons for muffing the AI bunny. Apple is struggling with its China “syndrome.” Will the nuclear reactor melt down, fizzle out, or blow up? Apple’s future in hardware may become radioactive.
Telegram is working under the shadow of the criminal trial lumbering toward its founder and owner Pavel Durov. More than a dozen criminal charges and a focused French judicial figure have Mr. Durov reporting a couple of times a week. To travel, he has to get a note from his new “mom.”
But well-run companies don’t let things like China dependency or 20 years in Fleury-Mérogis Prison upset trillion dollar companies or cause more than one billion people to worry about their free text messages and non fungible tokens.
“Leadership,” not technology, strikes me as the problem with AI challenges. If AI is so big, why did two companies fail to get the memo? Inattention, pre-occupation with other matters, fear? Pick one or two.
Stephen E Arnold, August 14, 2025
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