Apple hasn’t launched a single new product category since they unveiled the AirPods back in 2016. Sure, the AirPods Max debuted in 2020, but it wasn’t a bold leap as much as natural progression. The point I’m really trying to make here is that it’s been a while since the company was ‘recklessly innovative’, and it seems like we might just get a taste of that three days from now at WWDC.

Augmented Reality has always been Tim Cook’s favorite buzzword, and he’s consistently pushed for Apple to have a presence in this space. It’s expected that all this will culminate in what analysts and leakers call “Reality”, Apple’s first XR headset. This cutting-edge device, expected to be unveiled at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference, aims to pioneer the relatively uncharted realm of mixed-reality technology. With a price tag of approximately $3,000, the ‘Reality’ headset has been seven years in the making, and has been apparently filled with controversy too, with a large chunk of Apple’s own employees expressing doubt and disdain. However, here’s everything we know about the Reality headset (or could it be a pair of glasses?) that’s set to launch this Monday.

Concept Images by Kylin Wu
(Rendered on KeyShot: Click Here to Download Your Free Trial Now!)

The headset’s design journey has oscillated between being thick and obtrusive, like your average VR headset, to being as slim as a pair of spectacles, or realistically, a pair of chunky ski goggles. At its heart, however, lies the innovative xrOS, designed to provide an interface that echoes the familiar iOS experience. The new operating system (which is pretty much confirmed thanks to a trademark filed by Apple in New Zealand) is set to revolutionize how users interact with their devices, presenting a traditional Home Screen in an entirely new dimension filled with apps and customizable widgets.

One of the most exciting features of ‘Reality’ is its ability to merge digital elements with the real world. The xrOS software could potentially project AR app interface elements onto actual objects, creating a seamless mixed-reality overlay effect. This represents a significant leap forward in AR technology, blurring the boundaries between the physical and digital worlds. According to MacRumors, the ‘Reality’ device will achieve this using “dual high-resolution 4K micro OLED displays with up to 3,000 pixels per inch for a rich, realistic, and immersive viewing experience.” To operate the device, the user’s hands and eyes will be monitored by over a dozen optical cameras. The user can select an on-screen item by simply looking at it and activate it by making a hand gesture, such as a pinch.

The core of xrOS will feature re-imagined versions of Apple’s staple apps. From Safari to Messages, Apple TV+ to Apple Music, users will have the flexibility to work with multiple apps simultaneously, ensuring a dynamic and engaging user experience. Apple is also set to transform existing services into immersive viewing experiences. Imagine watching videos in virtual reality as if on a giant screen, or engaging in guided meditations enhanced by immersive visuals, audio, and voiceovers. Services like Apple Fitness+, Apple TV+, and a 3D version of Apple’s collaborative Freeform tool are set to offer these radical experiences in xrOS. In addition to the reimagined versions of existing apps, Apple is likely to introduce new offerings tailored to the unique capabilities of the ‘Reality’ headset. These would include a Books app for immersive reading, a Health app focusing on psychological wellness, and a Camera app that can capture images from the headset’s cameras, promising a whole new level of interaction and engagement.

Apple is reportedly also working with a select number of game developers to help them update their existing content for mixed reality. Furthermore, Apple reportedly has a robust set of tools that will allow non-developers to create their own AR/VR experiences, even without coding skills. These user-created AR apps could be distributed on the App Store alongside developer-created apps​​.

The Reality headset doesn’t come without its fair share of controversy. It remains one of the most divisive products even within Apple’s own company, with multiple people leaving the project to move to other divisions within Apple, or leaving the company entirely. Multiple engineers have expressed their opinion that Tim Cook should wait before the product is “good enough” for consumers… a feeling that people on Apple’s board have expressed too. Cook gave multiple key executives and personnel a preview of the Reality headset a little over a month ago, one of them being credible Apple reporter Mark Gurman of Bloomberg. However, it seems like Cook’s been adamant about releasing the headset as soon as possible, although as a developer product rather than a consumer-ready gadget. This will probably help set the groundwork needed to make a much more consumer-friendly Reality headset somewhere down the line. Until then, we have our fingers crossed and our calendars set for June 5th, 10 am PST!

The post Apple to Announce Their First Ever Augmented Reality Glasses in 3 days… Here’s What to Expect first appeared on Yanko Design.

The moment Carl Pei departed OnePlus and unveiled the Nothing brand, all of us knew exactly what was in store. When the Ear (1) TWS earbuds dropped, we knew it was just a precursor to a smartphone. Surely enough, Pei took the stage in the summer of 2022 to announce the Phone (1), a device that promised to shake the status quo. The Nothing phone (1) was unveiled with pretty impressive specs and a ridiculous £399 GBP ($475 USD) price tag – ridiculous by flagship standards, definitely. It’s been almost a year since that landmark moment, and looks like Nothing is gearing up for round 2. The company just announced that the Phone (2) will be revealed at a keynote event ‘this summer’, and following Pei’s visit to Mobile World Congress this year, we know that it’ll be using the Snapdragon 8+ Gen1 chipset.

However, the upcoming Phone (2)’s specs just dropped online, and the company (just like last time) released a cryptic render of a close-up that highlights one thing for sure – the Phone (2) will be an exercise in iterative improvement, just like the Ear (2) which released earlier this year. This concept by YouTuber Concept Central showcases what the new Nothing phone could look like. It retains the transparent design language and Glyph Interface, but makes just enough changes to really set the 2nd generation model apart.

Designer: Concept Central

The thing with making smartphones is that it’s an incredibly difficult task on a shoestring budget. For a company like Nothing, changing the design of every subsequent model means redesigning, re-engineering, and re-tooling… and that can drain a startup’s capital. That’s why the Ear (2) looked so similar to the Ear (1) because it hoped to establish two things. One, that Nothing’s design is on point, and that something that doesn’t look old and outdated doesn’t need revamping. And two, it’s easier to establish a brand by sticking to a visual design but making minor changes over the years. The Phone (2) concept from Concept Central reinforces that fact.

The Phone (2), for the most part, looks a lot like its predecessor, but has one glaringly obvious change – the camera array. Now with three cameras instead of two, the smartphone gets a minor (yet significant) makeover. The Glyph Interface gets a slight change, which in turn acts as a visual symbol of progress, and the camera system gets an upgrade, with a third lens added to the mix. This 3-lens array would also probably help the Nothing Phone (2) shine better in MKBHD’s blind smartphone camera tests.

The Glyph Interface has a touch of familiarity, but is different enough to look like an ‘upgrade’.

The side profile remains unchanged, giving the phone consistency.

The unique camera bump not only looks appealing on the Phone (2), but it would also make the device differentiate itself from the iPhone

The front of the phone looks exactly the same, although it runs the latest NothingOS 1.5 launcher on top of Android 13. Google is expected to announce Android 14 this week, although I’ll be surprised if the new Nothing Phone (2) gets the upgrade this soon.

As per GSMArena, the upcoming Phone (2) is rumored to come equipped with the powerful Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset, along with either 8GB or 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 128GB or 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage. Its display is expected to measure 6.55 inches and feature an AMOLED panel with FullHD+ resolution, a 120Hz refresh rate, and an in-display fingerprint reader. The potential specs also include a 50MP main camera with OIS, as well as two other cameras, likely an ultrawide and auxiliary cam. The Phone (2) is also said to have stereo speakers and NFC capabilities. Additionally, the phone is rumored to boast a large 5,000 mAh battery that supports fast charging and wireless charging.

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Fold is Gold!

Most smartphone companies try to keep their flagship products (or any product really) under wraps in the hopes of a big reveal on the day of its launch. Not Google. If you politely ask them, they’ll just leak their own design to you like they did with the Pixel 4 back in 2019. Or maybe they’ll pre-emptively announce phones 6 months too soon like they did with the Pixel 7’s design during last year’s I/O. This time, it seems Google didn’t even WAIT for I/O, and decided to just casually drop the Pixel Fold announcement on Twitter. Set for a May 10 release, the Fold is Google’s first foray into the foldables market, following mostly Asian companies like Samsung, Huawei, Oppo, Xiaomi, and Motorola. The design is exactly what we’re expecting, following the book-shaped folding format seen on the Galaxy Z Fold series from Samsung. There’s no official word on any of the details and specs, although this short 8-second video tells us a lot about what to expect. It’s got over 200K views so far, although whether that translates to sales is an entirely different argument.

Designer: Google

May The Fold Be With Youhttps://t.co/g6NUd1DcOJ#GoogleIO #PixelFold
May 10 pic.twitter.com/K8Gk21nmo8

— Made by Google (@madebygoogle) May 4, 2023

Images of the Pixel Fold leaked earlier this week as prominent leakster Evan Blass shared them on Twitter. While these renders gave a pretty detailed view of the Pixel Fold’s design and even its screen layout and software elements, the confirmation finally came from Google’s team today as they shared the most comprehensive look at the phone yet. The 8-second video above shows a stunning-looking foldable with a dual-screen, 3-lens camera bump, and what feels like the slimmest hinge on any foldable yet.

The Pixel Fold’s interior screen features a slim black bezel, rather than an edge-to-edge display. The folding screen appears to have Android widgets and user interface elements that have been optimized for the larger screen size. It’s likely that the adaptive Android elements will be showcased during the Pixel Fold’s reveal.

It’s important to note, however, that foldable phones typically come with a higher price point than traditional smartphones. While Google has yet to release any official information on the price or specs of this device, it’s safe to assume that it will be significantly more expensive than their non-folding Pixel models.

While the public response to foldables in general has been incredibly tepid globally (folding phones seem to have only truly breached Asian markets), the reactions on Twitter seem overwhelmingly positive, as users are falling in love with the short snippet. Fair warning, though… rendered videos are never an indication of what a product will actually look like. The Pixel 7, although glamorous online, has shown signs of wear and tear with parts of the metallic casing of the camera bump being subject to scuffs, scratches, and even dents. At the end of 2022, some Pixel 7 users also reported that the glass in front of their camera lens randomly shattered without any warning. We’re yet to see what the Pixel Fold turns out like – so far we have no details aside from a launch date and a sign-up page on Google’s store webfront.

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Big changes are coming to the iPhone 15, including what looks like solid-state buttons, a potential titanium frame, and the world’s first Apple-certified USB-C port on an iPhone. Speaking of big changes, that camera bump is probably the thickest I’ve ever seen on an iPhone too. Gone are the days when Apple would try photoshop tricks to conceal the camera bump, and provide the phone’s thickness without the bump just to entice buyers. Given that the camera has now become perhaps the most important component on the iPhone, it’s getting its own real estate in a way that makes the camera really look like a separate entity.

These exclusive renders were made available to 9to5Mac based on what they claim is a credible CAD model from one of the iPhone’s makers. Materials seem speculative at this point, although 9to5Mac claims with a certain degree of surety that we may be looking at a titanium frame for the 15 Pro series (goodbye Bendgate). Other more visible details include the absence of the iconic mute switch over a button that sits flush against the iPhone’s frame, and that sweet, sweet USB-C port.

Designer: 9to5Mac

Inspecting the CAD model has revealed that the camera lens protrusion has more than doubled from the iPhone 14 Pro’s enormous cameras. At this point you could probably snap a MagSafe wallet to the back of your phone and it still wouldn’t protrude as much as the lenses on the 15 Pro’s camera module. The folks at 9to5Mac speculate that the camera will feature an all-new sensor technology that will “capture more light and reduce overexposure or underexposure in certain settings.”

Notably enough, however, the CAD file for the 15 Pro Max actually has a SMALLER camera bump than the 15 Pro. 9to5Mac attributes this to the probability of a new periscope lens system that will only be coming to the higher-end model in the Pro series. I can’t wait to see how Apple justifies this, and what it means for the iPhone 15’s sales. Will people actually spend a couple of hundred bucks more for a sleeker design? My gut definitely thinks so.

The Dynamic Island on the new iPhone 15 series is also rumored to be marginally smaller than the one seen on the 14 Pro from last year. Apple condensed the notch with newer iterations too, so this is no surprise… although rumor also has it that the Dynamic Island will now make its way to all iPhone 15 variants and not just the Pro models.

A deep-dive into the 15 Pro’s camera architecture. You can even see the image stabilizer inside the phone

The biggest change on the iPhone, however, is undoubtedly Apple’s (forced) migration to USB-C. Following EU legislation brought about by the rise in e-waste by Apple not following a set standard, the company is now shifting its iPhone to USB-C, although other Apple products like the AirPods, Magic Mouse, Magic Keyboard, and Magic Trackpad will still retain the Lightning charging connector… for now.

A lot of people are also speculating that this shift to USB-C is going to be met with some form of Apple-style resistance. The iPhone won’t directly be compatible with all USB-C cables, dongles, and accessories. Like with the iPad Pro, only MFi-certified accessories will work as intended with the phone, and even fast-charging cables, adapters, and power bricks will be limited by the phone itself unless they comply with the MFi standards. This effectively means your Android fast charger or GaN fast charger could effectively be rendered useless with the iPhone, which would still charge at the same slow speed.

Although we’re quite a few months away from the iPhone’s release, these renders and rumors help consumers be mentally prepared for what’s to come. After all, a $1200 purchase shouldn’t be a spur-of-the-moment decision, right?

The iPhone 15 is rumored to drop in September, when Apple hosts its iPhone and Apple Watch event. Prior to that, we’re expecting a taste of Apple’s mixed-reality headset (rumored to be called Apple Reality Pro) in June during Apple’s WWDC event.

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When Electric Dreams Fizzle, Brew Up a Pilsner

Elon Musk is a man of many talents. Manufacturing cars or effectively running a social media network isn’t one of them… but now being a beer connoisseur apparently is. After launching a limited run of Tesla Tequila back in 2020, the world’s richest man is hawking a US$98 three-pack of GigaBier in select European countries. The limited-edition Pilsner-style beer bottle takes its design cues from the much-hyped, yet still elusive, Cybertruck and sports a gloss-black finish and glow-in-the-dark labeling. The alcohol itself is brewed in Berlin with Tesla’s exclusive strain of “Cyberhops” (does Elon even pay his marketing team anymore) and is said to have “notes of citrus, bergamot, and sweet fruit” and an ABV of 5%.

The GigaBier, which definitely ISN’T a joke, comes in a pack of three, within a foam-lined black box that is undoubtedly going to give this alcohol collectible status. The three-pack retails for £79/€89 (or just under $100) and is available exclusively in Europe on Tesla’s GigaBier microsite. Strangely enough, as of writing this piece, the beer still hasn’t sold out so if you’re still waiting on the Cybertruck, just pull out your $100 pre-order deposit and buy the beer instead. At least you know this thing actually exists.

In a world where Elon Musk once captivated audiences with his grandiose visions of electric vehicles and space travel, it’s somewhat fitting that his latest venture is a beverage that invites us to drink our sorrows away. After all, instead of delivering on the Cybertruck and the Tesla Roadster, Musk has spent the last three years shifting his headquarters to Texas, selling Cyberwhistles, buying and bungling social networks, and banning people tracking his private jet. So, raise your glass and toast to the GigaBier, a testament to the fact that sometimes, when life gives you lemons, just cut up a few wedges and have them with beer.

The post Elon Musk adds “Beer Sommelier” to his list of accomplishments with Tesla GigaBier (It’s 100% real) first appeared on Yanko Design.

The Sonos Era 300, along with its smaller sibling, the Era 100, packs massive sound in a small package. While the Era 100 serves as an upgrade to the Sonos One in size, hardware, and sound, the Era 300 is the Sonos’ “breakthrough spatial audio speaker”, with drivers that fire audio in every conceivable direction (including even upward) to turn any room into a concert hall. “With next-level audio that hits from every direction, Sonos Era 300 doesn’t just surround you, it puts you inside your music”, say the folks at Sonos.

Designer: Sonos

The Era 300 is Sonos’ open challenge to Apple’s Spatial Audio. Its hourglass-shaped design hides four tweeters that direct sound left, right, forward, as well as upward. This unique architecture helps efficiently utilize the space the speaker is located in, with that cleverly engineered upward tweeter using the ceiling as a bouncing board to create that spatial audio experience. Along with the four tweeters are two woofers that provide a rich creamy layer of bass, and custom waveguides that enhance audio dispersion for an expansive soundstage.

Sonos currently supports Dolby Atmos Music via Amazon Music Unlimited for the Spatial Audio experience.

While designed to work remarkably as a solo unit, the Era 300 delivers a much more hypnotic multichannel experience when two are paired as a stereo home theater setup. Movie fans can connect two speakers with Arc or Beam (Gen 2) for a hyperrealistic 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos sound experience that’s greater than the sum of its parts.

The Era 300 boasts WiFi connectivity to let you stream the highest-quality audio formats (including Dolby Atmos via Amazon Music) from anywhere in your home without any interruptions. The speaker works with all popular music streaming apps, with support for AirPlay 2, and even has Sonos Voice Control for controlling playback via your voice. For the more traditionally-minded, however, there’s Bluetooth connectivity, and a USB-C line-out that lets you connect your speaker to a turntable or any other wired source (via the Sonos Line-In Adapter).

Touted as the next-gen smart speaker, the Era 100 is the smaller of the two new speakers from Sonos. Designed as a visual and performance upgrade to the Sonos One, it sports a similar size but with a cylindrical profile, and boasts a dual-tweeter array that produces a detailed stereo separation, along with a significantly larger midwoofer for a richer bass. Unlike the One, the Era 100 has Bluetooth connectivity, along with a USB-C line-in that lets you connect wired sources to your speaker.

The Era 100 doesn’t have Spatial Audio like its larger sibling, notably because it doesn’t possess an upward-firing tweeter. Instead, the Era 100 provides detailed stereo sound thanks to two angled tweeters and custom waveguides that amplify the dispersion of sound waves to create a wider soundstage. Its upper surface houses the familiar dimpled control panel that lets you control and configure playback.

The Era 100 also boasts WiFi connectivity along with support for Bluetooth, AirPlay 2, and wired audio. You can also play music and manage your system hands-free and privately with Sonos Voice Control.

Setting up both the Era 100 and Era 300 is simple, thanks to the Trueplay app that measures the acoustics of your room and then fine-tunes the EQ of your speaker to deliver the best audio quality for your space. For more custom controls, the Sonos app lets you manually adjust bass, treble, and loudness to suit your personal needs.

Both the Era 100 and Era 300 are made with post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastic and packaged in 100% sustainably sourced paper, while highlighting a design that’s built for serviceability by reducing the use of adhesives and transitioning to screws for easy disassembly and repair.

Available starting March 28th, 2023, the Sonos Era 100 is priced at $249, and the Era 300 sports a price tag of $449.

A look at the Sonos Era 300 through a transparent outer body

The post The Sonos Era 300 with six drivers and Dolby Atmos challenge Apple in their ‘spatial audio’ battleground first appeared on Yanko Design.

Flying cars as a mode of transport have been long overdue, but Adelaide-based Alauda Aeronautics wants to run before it can walk. Meet the Airspeeder MK4, a hydrogen-powered crewed flying racecar that has a top speed of 360 km/h (225 mph), a range of 300 km (188 miles), and is all set to premiere at the 2024 Airspeeder Racing Series. It also holds the current record for being the fastest hydrogen-powered eVTOL ever built.

Designer: Alauda Aeronautics

The Airspeeder MK4’s aesthetic instantly stands out as more than just your average eVTOL. Look at it long enough and you’ll see some distinct similarities with a Formula 1 racecar. With propellers instead of wheels, this bad boy has the same aerodynamic form, with a carbon fiber monocoque boasting of front and rear wings, and a single-seater cockpit in between them. Four repositionable propellers sit where you’d expect the wheels, and can face either upwards, forwards, or sideways to help the vehicle lift off the ground, travel forward, and make dramatic turns in mid-air.

At the heart of the Airspeeder MK4 is the Thunderstrike Hydrogen Turbogenerator, a 1340 hp, 1000 kW turbogenerator electric engine specifically designed for use in eVTOLs. It gives the Airspeeder a range of 300 kilometers (118 miles) and allows it to reach top speeds of 360 km/h (225 mph) in merely 30 seconds. Arguably pretty important for a racecar, I’d say.

Now in its fourth iteration (hence the MK4 moniker), the eVTOL has a take-off weight of 950 kilograms. Once in the air, an AI-controlled gimbal thrust system allows the Airspeeder to maneuver in mid-air. Each propeller is mounted on a lightweight 3D-printed gimbal, easily allowing the Airspeeder to travel rapidly in any direction and even make sharp turns in the air.

The MK3 (its predecessor) has successfully completed over 350 remote-controlled test flights, even participating in two Airspeeder demonstration races in South Australia last year (2022). The company’s all set to have the MK4 make its mark next year with the first-ever Airspeeder Racing Series in the first-ever manned flying car race.

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Keeping your eye on the ball never got easier!

Using a format and technique similar to those airless car tire concepts we’ve seen before, Wilson’s latest airless basketball employs a similar see-through 3D-printed mesh to create a ball that bounces just like a basketball… but looks like nothing any basketball you’ve ever seen before. The design was unveiled at the NBA Slam Dunk Contest, with Houston Rockets forward KJ Martin taking the ball for a literal spin. Quite to everyone’s amazement, the Airless Basketball prototype responds to stimulus exactly like the standard inflated basketball. It’s easy to grip, has a surprisingly responsive bounce, and defies convention with its unique aesthetic!

Designer: Wilson Sporting Goods Co.

Created as an experimental prototype by Wilson Sporting Goods Co.’s R&D (Basketball) division, the Airless Basketball prototype is a stunning piece of design and engineering that looks, weighs, and bounces just like a basketball, but fundamentally rethinks the ball’s physical structure and underlying physics. The ball employs a 3D hexagonal mesh structure that’s highly elastic, enabling it to bounce just like a pressurized ball. However, its airless nature means it never needs maintaining or refilling, unlike standard basketballs that lose their bounce when they deflate mildly.

What’s so impressive about the Airless Basketball, apart from its jaw-dropping aesthetic, is that it completely rewrites the rulebook. Most basketballs have their signature bounce because they’re filled with pressurized air. Reduce the pressure and the ball just flops onto the floor with a dissatisfying thud. Wilson’s redesign goes against that notion, thanks to its unique structure and elastomeric material. Arrived through multiple design iterations and rigorous testing at the NBA test facility in Ada, Ohio, the ball cleverly balances tradition and innovation, with a futuristic mesh design that still feels relatively familiar in the hand, having the same weight as a regulation basketball and even the familiar seams for players to rest their fingers in.

The ball’s brilliant redesign comes from Wilson’s R&D division, led by Dr. Nadine Lippa, Kevin Krysiak, and a team of designers and engineers. As they worked on ‘reinventing the basketball’, Lippa knew pretty much instantly that such a complex structure could only be achieved through additive 3D printing. Having gone through multiple iterations, the team arrived at the design we see today, featuring the hexagonal mesh that not only gives the ball its signature bounce but also creates a grippy texture, much like the dotted pattern found on existing balls.

The team partnered with EOS, a 3D-printing solutions company, to help build the functional prototype. The ball started out as a pit of white powder, coming to life as the powder was melted into shape using a laser in a process commonly known as SLS or selective laser sintering. After the print was complete, the team dusted off the excess powder, before ‘sealing’ the design into its shape using yet another machine. Black dye was then injected into the model in a third and final process, giving us the final, finished ball. It’s unclear how long the entire process took, although 3D printing is known to be a relatively slower process. The trade-off, however, is a ball that requires much less upkeep and doesn’t ever need pumping or refilling.

Although the ball was just previewed for merely a handful of seconds at the Slam Dunk Contest, we’re yet to see it be used in an entire match. A lot of factors remain undetermined, like the ball’s lifespan, resistance to damage, how well players can grip it, whether objects can get stuck inside the ball’s mesh, how it reacts to spin, and what its overall aerodynamics are.

Wilson isn’t planning on manufacturing these for retail or for professional games. This prototype is the result of a long-term experiment to push the boundaries of innovation at the company and test out new materials and structures. Basketballers can be an incredibly superstitious bunch, and notoriously resistant to major change, so don’t expect to see this in any NBA games soon… although maybe it could debut as an add-on upgrade in NBA Live! EA Sports, make it happen!

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Is OnePlus finally responding to estranged founder Carl Pei’s latest company?

Nine days ago, Carl Pei did something most CEOs don’t usually do. He uploaded a review of the OnePlus 11 on Nothing’s YouTube channel. After leaving OnePlus in 2020, Carl severed all association with the company he founded, focusing instead on Nothing – his new venture. This YouTube video was a fun way of looking at how far OnePlus had come after his departure. Today, OnePlus (now an Oppo subsidiary) replied with a cryptic image showing a phone that looks rather heavily inspired by the Nothing phone (1). The device, titled the OnePlus 11 Concept, will debut at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this following week.

Designer: OnePlus

Details on the OnePlus 11 Concept are extremely scant, but a user on Weibo did leak the above image, giving us a rather comprehensive look at what the phone’s back will visually appear to be. The otherwise black back panel is punctuated by a series of icy blue lines, hinting at either lighting or a novel liquid cooling system. The back panel’s rumored to be made from carbon fiber, with the blue lines running right underneath it, as is shown in the image below. There’s even a blue ring around the phone’s camera bump, giving the entire conceptual phone a distinctly futuristic, almost-TRON-like appearance. Details around the OnePlus 11 Concept will be revealed at MWC in Barcelona, which starts on Monday, February 27th.

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We’ve all been there: you ask Siri a question, and it responds with the ever-frustrating “Sorry I didn’t understand that”. It could be an accent or dialect problem, the fact that Siri isn’t trained on the vast volume of data that Google’s AI is trained on, or just that Apple absolutely dropped the ball on Siri. Apple launched the voice AI as an app almost 13 years ago, although Siri today still feels noticeably dumb and unhelpful even after more than a decade. Google’s voice AI seems to overwhelmingly be the most popular choice nowadays, although there’s a new kid on the block that’s absolutely eating Google’s lunch, at least in the search department.

Unveiled less than a year ago, ChatGPT from OpenAI took the world by storm for its incredible natural language processing capabilities, hitting a million users in just 5 days, and 100 million users in just two months (that’s faster than the growth seen by social media giants like Facebook, Google, and even Snapchat). ChatGPT’s intelligent and human-like responses make it the perfect AI chatbot, especially given that it really understands natural sentences much better than most other AI tools, and it’s most likely to respond with a helpful answer than an apology. Developer Mate Marschalko saw this as a brilliant opportunity to integrate ChatGPT’s intelligence with Siri, turning it into a much more helpful voice AI. With a little bit of hackery (which just took him about an hour), Marschalko combined Siri’s voice features with ChatGPT’s NLP intelligence using Apple’s Shortcuts feature. The result? A much better Voice AI that fetches better search results, offers more meaningful conversations, and even lets you control your smart home in a much more ‘human-friendly’ way… almost rivaling Tony Stark’s JARVIS in terms of usability. The best part? You can do it too!

Marschalko lists out his entire procedure in a Medium blog post that I definitely recommend checking out if you want to build your own ‘SiriGPT’ too, with an approach that required absolutely no coding experience. “I asked GPT-3 to pretend to be the smart brain of my house, carefully explained what it can access around the house and how to respond to my requests,” he said. “I explained all this in plain English with no programme code involved.”

The video above demonstrates exactly how Marschalko’s ‘SiriGPT’ works. His home is filled with dozens of lights, thermostats, underfloor heating, ventilation unit, cameras, and a lot more, making it the perfect testing ground for possibly every use case. Marschalko starts by splitting up his tasks into four distinct request types. The four request types are labeled Command, Query, Answer, and Clarify, and each request type has its own process that GPT-3 follows to determine what needs to be done.

Marschalko’s AI is significantly better at processing indirectly worded commands.

Where the magic really unfolds is in how even indirect requests from Marschalko are understood and translated into meaningful actions by the assistant. While Siri and other AI assistants only respond to direct requests like “turn the light on”, or “open the garage door”, GPT3 allows for more nuanced conversations. In one example, Marschalko says “Notice that I’m recording this video in the dark, in the office. Can you do something about that,” and the assistant promptly turns on the light while responding with an AI-generated response instead of a template reply. In another example, he says “my wife is on the way driving home, and will be here in 15 minutes. Switch lights on for her outside just before she parks up”, to which the assistant responds with “The lights should be turned on by the time your guest arrives!”, demonstrating two powerful things… A. The ability to grasp concepts as complex as ‘wanting to switch a specific light on after a delay of a couple of minutes’, and B. Responding in a natural manner that conveys that they understood exactly what you wanted to be done.

Marschalko hooked all this into a shortcut called Okay Smart Home, and to power it, all he had to do was activate Siri and say the name of the shortcut (in this case “Okay Smart Home”) and then begin talking to his assistant. The four request types basically allowed Marschalko to cover all kinds of scenarios, from controlling smart home appliances with the Command request to asking the status of an appliance (like the temperature of a room or the oven) with the Query request. The Answer request covers more chat-centric queries like asking the AI for recommendations, suggestions, or general information from across the web, and the final Clarify request would allow the AI to ask you to repeat or rephrase your question if it was unable to detect any of the three previous request types.

Although this GPT-powered assistant absolutely runs circles around the visibly dumber Siri, it doesn’t come for free. You have to set up an OpenAI account and buy tokens to access its API. “Using the API will cost around $0.014 per request, so you could perform over 70 requests for $1,” Marschalko says. “Bear in mind that this is considered expensive because our request is very long, so with shorter ones you will pay proportionally less.”

The entire process is listed in this Medium blog post if you want to learn how to build out your own assistant with its distinct features. If you’ve got an OpenAI account and want to use the AI that Marschalko built in the video above, the Okay Smart Home shortcut is available to download and use with your own API keys.

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