Apple WWDC 2024 LIVE updates: All the expected announcements including iOS 18, AI features and more

It was a tossed-off remark, but the introduction of Rich Communication Services (RSC) text messaging protocal means that Apple’s Messages app will be better integrated during communications with Android phones.

Two new features announced just now at WWDC are already garnering raves online.

The first, auto-scheduling for text messages via Apple’s Messages app, takes a feature that has made emailing easier for remote work and teamwork and redeploys it for smoothing out personal life interactions also. Apple’s example was automating a birthday text, but there’s guaranteed to be many ways it helps the average person.

The second, more elaborate innovation, allows users to send messages via satellite when they are out of range of traditional cell phone or wireless internet networks. The added connectivity is likely to literally save lives during natural disaters or accidents that occur in remote areas with low connectivity.

In addition to the expected unveiling of the headset’s new operating system, Apple has announced that the breathtakingly high-tech and expensive VR goggles will be rolling out across the world this summer.

On June 28, the Vision Pro will hit Asia, going on the market in China, Japan and Singapore.

Then, on July 12, the goggles will be coming to the rest of the west, becoming available in the UK, Australia, Canada, France, and Germany.

After an intentionally cute ‘skydiving’ intro, Apple’s CEO Tim Cook kicked things off with a sprawling teaser for their in-house entertainment streamer’s offerings for Apple TV+.

Packed with A-list Hollywood talent, from George Clooney and Brad Pitt in the upcoming film ‘Wolfs,’ to Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum in ‘Fly Me to the Moon,’ the tech company seems to be throwing its weight around and spending big to gain an edge on its competitors.

On the site formerly known as Twitter, Tesla mogul Elon Musk’s X platform, reactions to the months of rumors about Apple’s plan to brand its own collaboration with OpenAI as ‘Apple Intelligence’ has provoked everything from blind boosterism to whithering contempt.

Jason Fried, CEO of 37signals which makes project management software Basecamp, told his followers that ‘the “artificial” in AI has always felt wrong’ as he praised Apple’s simple branding exercise as a ‘great name.’

Others posted memes clearly meant to ding the company for taking an obvious route they found more unimaginative than elegant or clever.

As one former data scientist for Twitter put it, criticizing the gush of praise for the name, ‘You people are so incredibly easy to impress. It boggles the mind.’

Nothing official has been said yet about Apple’s agreement with OpenAI to incorporate the Microsoft-owned company’s ChatGPT into its well-known iOS voice-based personal assistant Siri, but here’s what we know going into WWDC 2024 today.

Apple’s vice president of corporate development, Adrian Perica, has been quietly leading the charge to integrate the two, according to anonymous sources who spoke to the New York Times — with the hope that the end result will be a Siri that’s more conversational and versatile.

Unlike its rivals however, Apple’s core brand has been built on being intuitive and easy to use for the average person, so the company is the least likely to take any big risks with its AI offering.

‘Apple is pretty conservative when it comes to everything, so I don’t know that they will “wow” people,’ Carolina Milanesi, president of Creative Strategies, a tech research firm, told the Times.

‘But they have to do this because it will be how we interact with technology going forward,’ she said.

After months of anticipation, the wait is finally almost over for Apple fans, as the tech giant’s annual tech event is about to commence.

Apple says the Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), which kicks off today at Apple Park in California, will be an ‘extraordinary week of technology.’