Jony Ive, Laurene Powell Jobs talk tech, friendship, and AI
Tim Cook, Laurene Powell Jobs and Jony Ive join Kara Swisher to talk Steve Jobs some time ago
Former Apple designer, Sir Jony Ive and Laurene Powell Jobs spoke with the Financial Times this week to discuss Ive’s recent deal with OpenAI.
An Apple challenger?
Under that deal, Ive and a team he has put together join OpenAI to work on future products and interfaces. Word on the street is that this may represent a significant challenge to Apple, particularly as it struggles in AI development.
That both the widow of Apple founder Steve Jobs and the iMac/iPhone/iPad designer, Ive are both involved in the plan adds a rush of wind to these wings. They discuss their lengthy relationship “I was often at the house,” said Ive. “All there is, is work and love. Love and work.”
The interview took place in the San Francisco offices of LoveFrom, which Powell Jobs invested in after Ive left Apple in 2019. “If it wasn’t for Laurene,” he says, “there wouldn’t be LoveFrom,” he said. She also invested in Ive’s AI company which was acquired by OpenAI last month.
Tech is troublesome
They don’t talk much about what’s coming there, but do drop some choice quotes to provide a sense of direction:
“While some of the less positive consequences [of technology] were unintentional, I still feel responsibility,” says Ive.
Both refer specifically to screen addiction and the bugbear of social media (which I’d argue was quite good before billionaires turned it into weaponry).
“Whatever the device is, driving its design is “a sense of: we deserve better. Humanity deserves better,” said Ive, adding that working with OpenAI has made him more optimistic.
They discuss how Silicon Valley has changed and urge that humanity can be. Force for good, but it doesn’t always work out that way. “We now know, unambiguously, that there are dark uses for certain types of technology,” warns Powell Jobs.
Ive agrees. “If you make something new, if you innovate, there will be consequences unforeseen, and some will be wonderful and some will be harmful.”
AI, she adds, will “transform how we live, work, relate, communicate. It’s not clear what direction the world is headed.” She also says she remains very close to the leadership team in Apple. “I want them to succeed also,” she said.
Full interview here.
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