With Siri Recap, Apple threw a punch at OpenAI no one saw coming

John Ternus’ Apple threw a curveball at OpenAI with Siri Recap on Apple Watch, accelerating a conversation about privacy and data protection in an AI-augmented digital era. It’s a move that may yet contribute to finding a balance between scary surveillance and digital convenience. Think of it this way: Apple operates on such a big scale that it must have expected the feature to face regulatory and legal investigation. We know Apple has tried to stay on the right side of existing data protection and privacy laws by ensuring that its system doesn’t keep personal data, audio recordings, or transcripts, but one thing it doesn’t do is achieve consent from everyone who may be exposed to the feature. That’s a big no-no in some places, and it’s logical to think Apple expects some pushback to that. Apple thought it through From where I sit, it looks like Apple has thought about this. You only need to look to Apple Worldwide Marketing VP Greg Joswiak’s recent comments on the matter to see this, as he very swiftly tried to position Recap as little more than the digital equivalent of notebook and pen, or a smartphone set to record. The difference is that using the latter still technically req…

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