OpenAI Teases ‘Super Secret AGI’ 

On the fifth day of 12 Days of OpenAI, Sam Altman and co. took the opportunity to demonstrate how ChatGPT seamlessly integrates into the native AI experience inside an iPhone and a Mac. 

While the main announcement took centerstage, OpenAI intrigued its fans and users with an easter egg. On the iPhone used for the demo, a calendar event titled ‘Super Secret AGI’ seems to be scheduled. 

On the surface, it might look like an inside joke or vision to achieve AGI in the near future. 

Who knows? It is indeed possible that all of OpenAI’s announcements, cumulatively at the end of the 12 days, might give a sense of clarity as to what artificial general intelligence will look like and feel. Simply put, if people aren’t feeling the AGI yet, we don’t know what AGI really is. 

For instance, OpenAI’s recent release of its video generation model, Sora, gives an early glimpse of AGI—one frame at a time. This new model from the company—now accessible to Pro and Plus users—is leveraging video as a medium for training models in real-world logic and dynamics. 

“We’re just scratching the surface of what’s possible,” said Sam Altman. 

OpenAI’s Gift to Apple

Apple has released the latest iOS/iPadOS 18.2 and the macOS Sequoia update, which includes an updated feature set for Apple Intelligence. These include the Image Playground, Genmoji, an upgrade for the Writing Tools, and Siri – which are now powered by ChatGPT. 

Siri can now fetch information and respond to a user’s query using ChatGPT – but only when the user specifically asks it to use ChatGPT. The new Compose features let one access ChatGPT to generate text content on any writing tool across the system. 

Moreover, ChatGPT also aids the Visual Intelligence feature, which provides context to images from the user’s real-world environment. The new Camera Control button on the iPhone 16 Pro allows the user to quickly open up Visual Intelligence. On the Mac, OpenAI also demonstrated using Siri with ChatGPT to ask questions based on a 49-page PDF document. 

ChatGPT is available as an opt-in-only extension inside Apple Intelligence settings. One doesn’t necessarily need an account to use ChatGPT in Apple Intelligence. 

Most importantly, Apple Intelligence is now available with localised English support for Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, and the U.K. – while the official release for English (India) is set to be launched soon. 

Apple’s partnership with OpenAI is interesting, as it has been reported that the Cupertino giant isn’t paying OpenAI anything for the integration of ChatGPT on its devices. Rather, Apple sees value in adding ChatGPT to millions of iPhone, iPad and Mac users across the globe. It was also said that Apple was granted a board observer role at OpenAI, which was soon dropped after a few weeks. Furthermore, in October, Apple also reportedly backed out of OpenAI’s $6 billion funding round. 

Other features focus on adding text to visual tools to Apple devices. The Image Playground lets users generate images with styles and illustrations of their own and also supports creating visuals ‘likeness of a family member or friend using photos’.

Similarly, Genmoji lets the user create an emoji using a prompt, and like Image Playground, it allows using photos to create an emoji resembling real people. 

That said, Apple is still lagging behind Google in their AI offerings. More so, given the fact that Google dropped huge updates to Gemini 2.0. While it is only available via the API for developers, it will surely arrive for Pixel devices and other Android phones in due time. 

Although still in the testing stages, Project Astra received several upgrades, which now execute prompts inside tools like Google Search, Maps and Lens. The feature has been thoroughly tested on Android phones since it was launched at Google I/O this year. When it arrives on Android devices, Apple will have to seriously pull its socks up!