From Hype to Headache: Apple Faces Legal Action Over Delayed AI Features
- Apple’s aggressive marketing of its AI capabilities, dubbed “Apple Intelligence,” led to high consumer expectations and premium-priced product sales.
- The company’s failure to deliver on these promised features has resulted in a class action lawsuit seeking unspecified damages for misled customers.
- Apple’s struggles to keep up with competitors in the AI race have been compounded by internal challenges, including executive changes and a perfectionist approach to product development.
Apple, once a pioneer in the tech industry, finds itself embroiled in a legal battle over its much-hyped artificial intelligence features. The company’s aggressive marketing campaign, which saturated the internet, television, and other media outlets, promised consumers a transformative experience with its “Apple Intelligence” capabilities. However, the reality has fallen short of these lofty promises, leading to a proposed class action lawsuit filed in federal court.
The lawsuit, filed by the Clarkson Law Firm, alleges that Apple’s advertisements created a clear and reasonable expectation among consumers that the company’s AI features would be available upon the release of its latest iPhone models. This expectation, coupled with Apple’s ongoing efforts to convince consumers to upgrade at a premium price, drove unprecedented excitement in the market. However, the suit claims that the products featured “a significantly limited or entirely absent version of Apple Intelligence,” misleading consumers about the actual utility and performance of the devices.
The lawsuit specifically highlights an ad featuring actor Bella Ramsey touting Siri capabilities that are now delayed. While Apple has pulled this ad from YouTube, the suit argues that the company has failed to retract all the similarly false representations in the market that began in the summer of 2024. This failure to adequately remedy the situation has left consumers feeling deceived and seeking financial damages.
Apple’s struggles in the AI race are not limited to this lawsuit. The company has been facing challenges in keeping up with competitors such as Amazon and Google, who have been rolling out more advanced AI features. Apple’s planned improvements to Siri, originally set to debut in 2025, have been pushed back until 2026. This delay has been attributed to the company’s perfectionist approach to product development, as noted by Siri co-designer Luc Julia.
In a rare move, Apple has also demoted the executive in charge of Siri’s upgrades, John Giannandrea, who previously served as the head of search and AI at Google. The responsibility for Siri’s development has now been handed over to Vision Pro creator Mike Rockwell. These internal changes and delays have further compounded Apple’s challenges in the AI space.
As the lawsuit progresses, it remains to be seen how Apple will respond to these allegations of false advertising and unfair competition. The company’s reputation as an innovator in the tech industry is at stake, and its ability to deliver on its AI promises will be closely scrutinized. For now, consumers who purchased Apple Intelligence-capable devices are left waiting for the transformative features they were promised, while Apple grapples with the fallout from its delayed AI rollout.