
Despite the debate, Apple is introducing AI-generated summaries to the App Store.
Nadeem Sarwar / Digital Trends
After the issues created by Apple’s AI-generated summaries for news applications like the BBC and the New York Times, Apple is once again venturing into this area. The company has revealed that "review summaries" will soon be introduced to the App Store, designed to condense the most common points from numerous reviews into a single AI-generated summary. This feature was first reported by Macworld and has been officially announced on Apple’s developer site. The beta will commence with iOS 18.4 and iPadOS 18.4 as part of a phased rollout, starting with summaries in English for a select group of apps.
Apple states that the summaries will be updated at least weekly and will eventually be available for all apps that have "enough reviews." Although the specifics of what constitutes "enough" are not provided, further details may emerge in the future.
Like many AI summary features, this has the potential to be beneficial if it proves reliable. However, it wasn't long ago that Apple’s AI mistakenly claimed that tennis player Rafael Nadal had come out as gay—a stark illustration of how inaccurate AI can be, even regarding significant matters. While generating app review summaries may not lead to as severe consequences as incorrect news headlines, such errors could negatively impact app developers. For instance, if a summary includes an extreme viewpoint expressed in only a single review or fabricates information, developers could experience a decline in downloads and sales without justification.
Such mistakes wouldn't serve users either since they might miss out on a worthwhile app or download something that falls short of the summary's portrayal. Nevertheless, it is possible to execute this well—Amazon and Microsoft have been utilizing generated review summaries for nearly two years. Given that Apple is catching up in this sector, it is expected that this feature has been thoroughly tested to deliver accurate information. However, the rollout will be closely monitored to determine if any aggregation issues have been resolved.
Willow Roberts has been a Computing Writer at Digital Trends for a year, and she has been involved in writing for about a decade.
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Despite the debate, Apple is introducing AI-generated summaries to the App Store.
Apple is introducing AI-generated summaries to the App Store, but will this effort be more successful than their previous attempt with news summaries?