Tim Cook says Apple ‘never talked about’ charging for AI, here’s why

In the past few months, two major waves of Apple smart features have emerged through iOS 18.1 and iOS 18.2. While some have speculated that Apple plans to launch paid artificial intelligence services in the future, Apple CEO Tim Cook recently said that charging has never even been discussed. Here’s why.

Apple sees artificial intelligence as ‘a bit like multi-touch’

Steven Levy is at wired Recently interviewed Tim Cook About artificial intelligence and so on. There’s one quote that’s stuck with me since that interview was published earlier this month.

collection: Some companies charge for AI-enhanced services. Have you considered it?

chef: We never discussed fees. We think of it a bit like multi-touch, which enabled the smartphone revolution and modern tablets.

According to reports, Apple’s CEO himself directly stated that he had “never talked about” charging for artificial intelligence.

His reasoning is interesting, positioning artificial intelligence as a fundamental new technology like multi-touch and so on.

But it also highlights the vast differences between Apple and its artificial intelligence rivals.

I think this discrepancy points to a more important reason why Apple isn’t thinking about monetization.

Hardware remains Apple’s big business, funding everything else in the company

When multi-touch debuted on the original iPhone, it was technically a free feature, yes. But it was inseparable from new products that were very expensive at the time.

Apple Intelligence is very similar.

Apple won’t charge for artificial intelligence, but you won’t be able to use it either unless you buy one first Compatible iPhone, iPad or Mac.

Unlike most other artificial intelligence companies, Apple’s main business revolves around hardware construction.

The company does have a growing services business, but most of its revenue comes from Still related to hardware. On the hardware side, nothing compares to Apple’s iPhone revenue.

So, yes, Apple Intelligence is technically free as part of iOS 18.1 and iOS 18.2. But that’s only because Apple sold you an iPhone first.

Tim Cook knows this very well.

Apple can give away artificial intelligence for free because it does a great job selling us all new iPhones.

What do you think of Tim Cook’s comments? Let us know in the comments.

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