You’d be forgiven for thinking this day would never come. Siri has spent a decade and half somewhere between “sort of useful at a few things” and “utterly disastrous, why did I even try, can it honestly not even set a timer.” But the wildest thing just happened: Apple put out a new version of Siri, and it actually seems to be pretty good.
On this episode of The Vergecast, David and Nilay talk about their early experiences with Siri AI, and what it means for users, and the rest of the AI industry, for the iPhone’s built-in assistant to be good enough at most things. There’s very little about Siri AI that feels bleeding edge or brand new, but it works. And that might change everything.
After that, they talk about the changing winds in social networking, as Instagram, Bluesky, and YouTube all announced new features designed to make their huge ecosystems feel a little smaller and a lot more personal. Group chats have been replacing public posts for a while now, but is the era of the Twitter feed really over? After that, it’s time for the Hype Desk, Brendan Carr is a Dummy, and a lightning round filled with news about the Trump Phone, Claude Fable, solar energy, and a surprisingly good deal for iPad users.