The iPhone 50 years from now – and why Apple won't have AI execs

iPhone 70th anniversary edition will have a new camera

Apple CEO Tim Cook was also asked whether he could ever see the company being led by AI execs, and he said absolutely not, even in a 50-year time frame.

“When you look at the leadership page,” he says of future Apple, “there will not be an agentic kind of model on there.”

Joz said in a new interview that it’s hard to imagine that we won’t still be using an iPhone 50 years from now …

Source: 9to5Mac

NB: Initially I read that title as saying that there will not be anyone in charge of AI. That is far more interesting question…

…The reason AI cannot operate as an executive is primarily legal. Officers in a company have legal liability. The legal code does not allow for artificial liability. The notion of a "head of AI" is more interesting as I would also assert that there will be no such responsibility. This is because AI is a horizontal technology. It would be akin to having a head of computation or head of energy.

As far as iPhone lasting 50 more years, it would imply lasting beyond iPhone 70. We're about to see iPhone 20 (XX?). The Mac has made it to age 42 and it's not inconceivable that it should also last another 28 years, to age 70. Therefore the iPhone lasting 50 more years is merely the iPhone lasting as long as the Mac. The iPhone has broader appeal while maintaining a similar computing architecture. It's fully within reason to assume that it's a resilient platform. Only question is how many billion users there will be.

[Incidentally the Mac and the iPhone are both existing on top of the Unix operating system. Unix was initially developed circa 1970 and it is thus already 56 years old demonstrating its resilience.]