If I had purchased the iPhone 16 like I had planned on after seeing what Apple teased with Apple Intelligence at WWDC 2024, I’d be furious. Mark Gurman has the scoop on Apple’s upgraded Siri experience and it’s not good:

Apple Inc.’s turmoil in its AI division reached new heights on Friday, with the company delaying promised updates to the Siri digital assistant for the foreseeable future.

Apple said that features introduced last June, including Siri’s ability to tap into a user’s personal information to answer queries and have more precise control over apps, will now be released sometime in “the coming year.” The iPhone maker hadn’t previously set a public deadline for the capabilities, but they were initially planned for the iOS 18.4 software update this April.

Bloomberg News reported on Feb. 14 that Apple was struggling to finish developing the features and the enhancements would be postponed until at least May — when iOS 18.5 is due to arrive. Since then, Apple engineers have been racing to fix a rash of bugs in the project. The work has been unsuccessful, according to people involved in the efforts, and they now believe the features won’t be released until next year at the earliest.

Apple has reached a new low. Expectations are high for Apple because they made their bed by showcasing such a future forward AI experience at their annual WWDC event last year. Honestly, as I wrote that, I realized that’s not even the main issue. This is the main issue…

Apple, with its ‘crack marketing team’ as deemed by Craig Federighi, created this impressive ad. The problem? None of these features exist. The upgraded personal Siri, capable of providing helpful on-device information in a manner similar to Gemini or ChatGPT, is not yet available. I nearly purchased an iPhone 16, hoping this feature would be available by the end of 2024. Unfortunately, it wasn’t, and I’m sure many people, unaware of the feature’s delay, purchased the iPhone 16 expecting these features. Apple is one of the few tech companies that can release a product with delayed features without widespread customer backlash on platforms like Reddit or device returns. Consumers invest significant money in these devices, and I believe they are beginning to realize Apple is not immune to such issues. I used to believe Apple would only announce features ready for immediate and complete delivery. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. This time, I avoided being fooled, thanks to Mark Gurman’s reporting on Apple Intelligence.

In the meantime, I’m glad I stuck with Team Pixel and I’m looking forward to the continuation of Google’s Gemini advancements and the rumored on-device (Apple Intelligence-esque) “Pixel Sense” and “Pixie”.