Apple’s WWDC keynote is quick approaching, the place the corporate will unveil all its AI options for iOS 18, macOS 15, and extra.
I’ve written beforehand about how Apple has the potential to make AI mass-market with iOS 18 in a method few different firms can. I anticipate Apple’s presentation to largely concentrate on AI options which can be easy to make use of and serve current wants in a extra handy method. There most likely gained’t be many jaw-dropping moments throughout the keynote, however somewhat lots of nice-to-haves.
Nonetheless, after seeing what a brand new third-party autobiography app is doing with AI, I’m satisfied Apple may have a blow away second if it confirmed off an AI-supercharged Journal app.
The curious limitations of the Journal app
The Journal app is a curious providing from Apple. It was first launched ultimately 12 months’s WWDC as an iOS 17 characteristic, however didn’t find yourself delivery to customers till the finish of the 12 months in iOS 17.2. In an period the place Apple is pushing cross-platform options like SwiftUI and Mac Catalyst, Journal debuted as an iPhone unique. Consequently, you couldn’t (and nonetheless can’t) create and even view Journal entries in your iPad or Mac.
In some ways, I’m the Journal app’s goal buyer, and I’ve barely used the app.
I’m huge into journaling and have used Apple Notes to carry my journal for years. I used to be initially thrilled by the prospect of a devoted Journal app, however what ended up delivery was a disappointment. The shortage of cross-platform assist was a giant unfavorable, as I do most of my journaling on my iPad Professional. However I additionally struggled with the app’s restricted settings and show choices. You’ll be able to’t change how entries are sorted, or create folders to higher arrange them; you can also’t modify the default ‘card’ view for entries into one thing extra like a listing.
Journaling Strategies are a wonderful characteristic that makes me need to use the app, however as an alternative I’ve caught with Notes resulting from all the restrictions talked about above.
The inspiration for an AI-powered Journal app
I began occupied with the Journal app once more due to the AI-backed Autobiographer app that debuted at the moment. What’s particularly attention-grabbing about Autobiographer is that it’s going to ask you questions and get you to verbally share your private tales—ideas, reflections, experiences of the day—then use AI to show what you share right into a well-written narrative. Your phrases might be became prose, bundled in a PDF, and the place applicable, may be shared along with your family members as a method of sharing your life story with them.
Sarah Perez, writing for TechCrunch:
To make use of the app, you interact in conversations with an AI agent, constructed on Anthropic know-how, that prompts you to inform a narrative. For example, the preliminary immediate could ask you to inform a narrative about an journey you had, reminding you there’s no proper or unsuitable reply. You can begin talking, pause and resume recording, or transfer on to a different query, if you happen to choose…The app allows you to revisit matters, discover your reminiscences, after which in the end flip them into several types of prose — like a brief story or a gratitude letter for a beloved one.
As attention-grabbing as Autobiographer seems, the $199 annual price ticket means it’ll by no means be as accessible as a free, pre-installed Apple Journal app.
Apple baking AI into Journal may provide a equally compelling expertise, however in a method that’s out there to the plenty.
What AI may do for Apple’s Journal app
Journal already affords ‘Journaling Strategies’ that will help you get began on an entry. Think about if, along with these pictures, music playlists, or location solutions, the app may additionally handle the precise writing for you. Like Autobiographer, it may have you ever verbally share a little bit bit in response to given prompts, then the app may craft lovely prose that serves as a document of your life experiences.
Is it technically nonetheless journaling if you happen to’re not doing the writing? Possibly or possibly not, however this method would accomplish the identical function of holding a working document of your life. Positive you may nonetheless write your personal ideas down (as I might need to do myself), however if you happen to’re much less involved with the writing and extra with merely capturing the reminiscence, an AI-powered Journal app may do this with ease.
Truthfully, the present model of the Journal app appears solely arrange with this objective in thoughts already. It doesn’t appear very tailor-made to individuals who already love journaling and need to do all of the writing themselves; somewhat, it’s targeted on making journaling extra accessible and straightforward for a broader person base.
I actually hope Apple has some huge updates queued up for Journal in iOS 18. Bringing the app to iPad and Mac is a should. However there’s additionally a lot potential for AI to supply a profound, blow away expertise for customers of all kinds.
Do you utilize the Journal app? What AI options would you need to see added? Tell us within the feedback.
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