Apple's AI Text Summary Feature Delivers Breakup News in Beta Test

Apple's New AI Summarized a Series of Breakup Texts in the Most Brutal Way Possible

Apple's latest iOS software update for its iPhones includes a series of generative AI-enabled "Apple Intelligence" upgrades. Among the many upgrades is the option to receive message AI-generated "summaries" of unread messages. But in some scenarios, the feature could have some unintended, albeit hilarious consequences. Exhibit A: the breakup text. A man took to X-formerly-Twitter yesterday to share an utterly devastating screenshot of Apple's new AI message summary feature rounding up a series of breakup texts into succinct bullet points. Despite the emotional subject matter, Apple's AI paraphrased the dude's now-ex-girlfriend's parting messages into the breakup equivalent of Zoom meeting notes. "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment," reads the AI summary. "For anyone who's wondered what an Apple Intelligence summary of a breakup text looks like," software developer Nick Spreen captioned the post. In response to skepticism of whether the post was real, Spreen added in a follow-up post that "yes this was real" -- and that "yes it was my birthday." It's hard not to laugh at least a little at the dystopian screenshot, though we do feel bad that Spreen had to be a guinea pig for this particular slice of Apple's vision for the future of texting. Spreen, who confirmed the validity of the messages to Ars Technica, explained that the real breakup texts were "something along the lines of I can't believe you just did that, we're done, I want my stuff." "I do feel like it added a level of distance to it that wasn't a bad thing," Spreen told Ars. "Maybe a bit like a personal assistant who stays professional and has your back even in the most awful situations." "But yeah, more than anything it felt unreal and dystopian," he continued. Spreen's experience raises an important product question for Apple: are there some conversations that simply shouldn't be auto-mediated by a chatbot? A breakup notice is brutal enough, but imagine texts about a death in the family, or an ongoing crisis situation, getting neatly folded into AI-sanitized Teams call notes.

Apple Intelligence features can also summarize breakup texts for you

When Nick Spreen installed the beta of iOS 18.1 to try out upcoming Apple Intelligence features, he probably didn't expect to receive an AI-generated summary of breakup texts from his then girlfriend. "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment," the AI summarized. After sharing a screenshot of the unfortunate message on X, Ars Technica contacted Spreen to confirm its authenticity -- check out its story for more on the digital breakup. Many Apple Intelligence features have been designed to improve productivity and filter out signal from noise. For instance, text summaries can be useful in a group conversation with 68 unread messages. However, just as you wouldn't want to see birthday notifications for deceased family members on Facebook, no one needs a machine-generated breakdown of a breakup. Let's hope Apple makes some adjustments to the summary feature to improve Apple Intelligence's emotional intelligence.

The new iPhone's beta AI has been summarising breakup texts and we can't figure out if that's taking the sting or the soul out of interpersonal communication

This is just one more reason to break up with someone in person. The dreaded breakup text. One of the worst notifications you can get on a phone, other than that free trial you meant to cancel rolling over. With Apple's latest AI update, it can summarise texts so you don't have to manually read them, and that's equal parts creepy and kinda genius when applied to serious texts. In a viral tweet this week, spotted by Ars Technica, one unfortunate Twitter user was broken up with on their birthday and Apple Intelligence summarised the breakup text to say: "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." This is all thanks to the latest beta of Apple Intelligence, which owners of the iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, and iPhone 16 line can sign up for right now. It is still missing many of the key features Apple Intelligence was advertised as having but they are slowly rolling out to owners of the latest and greatest iPhones. Apple Intelligence is Apple's implementation of AI, with promises of on-device uses, such as generative emojis and text summarization being done with its own model, and ChatGPT picking up the slack with its search and writing tools. The full beta rollout is expected by December but the original poster got access to the text summary feature by signing up for the early beta. Though other Twitter users are understandably creeped out and empathetic to the original poster's situation, some have found themselves oddly comforted by the idea of an AI summary. One user says "Unironically into this (but I'm a little different emotionally)". Another says "Low key this is really nice tho... AI cuts through the bs and gets ya the info you need...". Other users push back on it, with one saying "Have you ever processed a human emotion... ever?" Ironic, given this is about AI, but the original post is a tad hard to navigate thanks to the verified accounts and bots hogging up all of the top replies. However, if you scroll down, you see heated arguments about whether or not this is a good thing, both interpersonally and culturally. Where some see a helpful tool to navigate hard emotional spaces, others see a parody of the bad uses of AI. Some believe it could help users process emotions while others believe it could stunt the emotional growth that can come from these periods of turmoil. As a bit of a generative AI sceptic, I don't think I would ever use a function like this. Not only do I think there's nuance to language that a summary would struggle to fully pick up but I think, given the heightened emotional state of a breakup, I would want to read that text for myself. This is before mentioning the coded language that comes from a long relationship -- phrases, unique in-jokes, and terminology. I think the summary would simply make me more anxious before clicking it, prolonging the dread around a situation like this. Breakup texts are never nice so I don't want to see one from my AI too.

This Is How Apple Intelligence's Notification Summaries Handle Breakup Texts

Relationships are complicated. One minute, you're happy and in love. The next, your iPhone is breaking up with you for your partner. What, is that not a universal experience? Your iPhone likely won't sit you down to let you know you and your partner are better off as friends, or that its them, and not you -- at least, not if you're using Apple's publicly available version of iOS. However, if you've bravely dipped your toe into the iOS 18.1 beta, you might have your heart broken by your smartphone and its new AI features. You can thank Apple Intelligence, and all the new AI-powered changes, that Apple is currently testing with its latest betas. Among a number of new features is notification summaries: Apple Intelligence reads through your notifications, including texts, and, like ChatGPT, breaks down the information into easy-to-read summaries. That goal is for you to glance at your notification summaries and catch up with what you missed, rather than waste time scrolling through a sea of alerts and reading each and every one. In theory, it's a neat way to stay on top of your missed messages. However, as more beta testers install iOS 18.1, we're starting to put theory to practice here. The latest example went viral, and for good reason: One user on X glanced down at his iPhone running iOS 18.1 to find a notification summary of texts from his then-girlfriend, which succinctly read: "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from apartment." The user shared the screenshot on X in a now-deleted post, adding that the summary was real, and that it was accurate to the texts sent, though he did not share the texts themselves (quite understandably). He also shared that it was only two texts, but that was enough to trigger the summary. It's likely not what Apple intended the feature to be, or how the company would like it advertised. But seeing as most people are sent a series of negative messages at one point or another, this is going to happen, and it's going to get summarized. Apple Intelligence only works on iPhone 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max, and the iPhone 16 series, so the user pool will be quite limited even when iOS 18.1 eventually drops. But when it does, those users might be a bit surprised by some of the summaries they receive. It's one thing to see bad news spelled out verbatim in a message from a friend; it's another thing entirely to have your iPhone edit, summarize, and hand-deliver that news to the top of your notification feed. The future is now, I guess.

Man learns he's being dumped via "dystopian" AI summary of texts

"No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment," Apple AI summarized. On Wednesday, NYC-based software developer Nick Spreen received a surprising alert on his iPhone 15 Pro, delivered through an early test version of Apple's upcoming Apple Intelligence text message summary feature. "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment," the AI-penned message reads, summing up the content of several separate breakup texts from his girlfriend -- that arrived on his birthday, no less. Spreen shared a screenshot of the AI-generated message in a now-viral tweet on the X social network, writing, "for anyone who's wondered what an apple intelligence summary of a breakup text looks like." This summary feature of Apple Intelligence, announced by the iPhone maker in June, isn't expected to fully ship until an iOS 18.1 update in the fall. However, it has been available in a public beta test of iOS 18 since July, which is what Spreen is running on his iPhone. It works akin to something like a stripped-down ChatGPT, reading your incoming text messages and delivering its own simplified version of their content. On X, Spreen replied to skepticism over whether the message was real in a follow-up post. "Yes this was real / yes it happened yesterday / yes it was my birthday," Spreen wrote. In response to a question about it being a fair summary of his girlfriend's messages, he wrote, "it is." We reached out to Spreen directly via email and he delivered his own summary of his girlfriend's messages. "It was something along the lines of i can't believe you just did that, we're done, i want my stuff. we had an argument in a bar and I got up and left, then she sent the text," he wrote. How did he feel about getting the news via AI summary? "I do feel like it added a level of distance to it that wasn't a bad thing," he told Ars Technica. "Maybe a bit like a personal assistant who stays professional and has your back even in the most awful situations. but yeah, more than anything it felt unreal and dystopian."

What's worse than a break-up by text? This savage Apple Intelligence dumping

Getting broken up with over text is hard enough, but imagine if you received an AI summary of a breakup to give you the bad news. That's what happened to one iPhone user with Apple Intelligence who's now single and ready to mingle. One of Apple Intelligence's biggest features in iOS 18.1 is notification summaries which condenses messages, emails, and other pop-ups into easily digestible bullet points. Unfortunately, however, Apple Intelligence can't quite get the gist when it comes to having a touch of humanity. Taking to X, user @spreen_co shared an image of his ex-girlfriend breaking up with him. The Apple Intelligence summary reads "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." He followed up with, "Yes this was real... Yes it happened yesterday... Yes it was my birthday." The tweet went viral with 3.8 million views, which might soften the blow a little, but won't replace his relationship. Apple Intelligence notification summaries are incredibly useful when they work, but they lack human empathy and often get the wrong end of the stick. I've written about notification summaries in the past, calling the tool the "one Apple Intelligence feature you'll want to turn off right away". In my testing, the funniest examples have popped up when multiple notifications of the same thing pile up. For example, my Ring doorbell notifications are often summarized into "5-7 people at your front door", which is pretty hilarious considering it sounds like there's about to be a home invasion. When it works, however, notification summaries is probably the most useful Apple Intelligence feature that will grace your iPhone when iOS 18.1 launches later this month. Condensing information to give you a quick glance of things like a shopping list from your partner or a date and time to meet someone are what the feature excels at, it's just a shame that it doesn't quite understand what it means to be human.

Apple Intelligence will summarise your breakup texts

Breakup messages are always painful to receive. Even when the sender is trying their best to be gentle and mindful of your feelings. Of course, not everyone is quite so adept at conveying difficult news in a damage-limitation parcel. Breakups can be messy, hurtful, and honest. Then there's the small matter of practicalities: of dividing up one's lives, our homes, possessions, keepsakes. That's not even considering when children, pets, and shared friendship groups are involved. A new AI tool is coming, which neatly summarises breakup texts, providing you with the key points without needing to pore over every word that your heartbreaker has sent you. When app developer Nick Spreen tried out the beta version of iOS 18.1, he experienced first hand the impact of Apple Intelligence's new features. When Spreen received a breakup text, Apple Intelligence went ahead and provided him with an AI-generated abridged version of the message. It read: "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." Straight to the point. Spreen posted a screenshot of the breakup text summary on X (formerly Twitter), followed by a tweet confirming that it is real. Is this the future of breakups? Or, is this just another attempt to "optimise" our emotions and our love lives -- something which doesn't entirely feel sustainable or realistic. According to evolutionary psychology, human beings are wired to process rejection as a threat to survival. An AI summary might soften the blow in the short-term, but ultimately, you'll probably still feel really upset about being dumped. You can't AI your way out of emotional processing! You've got to feel the feelings and move on. Look after yourselves! And remember: you're not being rejected, the relationship is.

'Unreal and Dystopian': Apple Intelligence Is Summarizing Breakup Texts So You Don't Have to Read Them

Leaders from Nvidia's Jensen Huang to JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon have hailed AI as the technology driving the next industrial revolution. And while AI can lead to business impact and productivity gains, it can also be "unreal and dystopian," one Apple Intelligence user discovered. On Thursday, Nick Spreen, an app developer based in New York, posted that Apple Intelligence summarized a breakup text from his now ex-girlfriend. The summary simply read, "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." Spreen told Ars Technica that the actual texts were more personal than the AI summary and that the summary "added a level of distance to it that wasn't a bad thing." Still, he said that "more than anything" getting an AI overview of a breakup text "felt unreal and dystopian." Spreen's post, which was viewed over four million times, had been deleted at the time of writing. Related: ChatGPT Is Roasting Instagram Profiles in a Hilarious New Social Media Trend -- Here's How to Get Access Apple Intelligence is the set of AI features specific to Apple devices, like AI voice-activated search, AI emoji generation, and AI email and text generation. The latest iOS 18.1 update, which rolled out this month, brings a beta version of Apple Intelligence to the iPhone to perform tasks like summarizing texts. While AI can be used in business contexts, it also has less serious use cases. In August, a viral trend saw Instagram users asking ChatGPT to roast their Instagram profiles. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said in a conversation with Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff last month that he mainly used the paid version of ChatGPT as a personal tutor. Benioff said that he uses ChatGPT as a therapist, a purpose echoed by other ChatGPT users, including content creators on social media. Using AI for emotional support is common -- in fact, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg stated that it was one of the top ways to use Meta AI so far. People are using the technology to talk through complex social situations, he said.

Apple Intelligence beta shows potential for humor - and heartbreak - with personal text summaries

Facepalm: When Apple Intelligence arrives with iOS 18.1 later this month, one of its features will summarize incoming emails, texts, and audio transcriptions to help users sort through them more quickly. Apple likely expects that the functionality will mainly assist with work communications, but beta testers are beginning to see how it impacts their personal lives. A New York-based software developer recently shared the Apple Intelligence beta's concise summary of a breakup text he'd received. The notification exemplifies how Apple's hopes for generative AI can collide with real life. When Apple Intelligence arrives with iOS 18.1 later this month, one of its features will summarize incoming emails, texts, and audio transcriptions to help users sort through them more quickly. Apple likely expects that the functionality will mainly assist with work communications, but beta testers are beginning to see how it impacts their personal lives. Developer Nick Spreen discovered that his former partner had broken up with him when Apple Intelligence summarized a message as "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." He received the text on his birthday. Last month, the Washington Post criticized Apple's take on generative AI for being no more resilient against hallucinations than OpenAI's ChatGPT or Microsoft's Copilot. It often misdescribed photos, made unwanted changes to pictures, provided incorrect directions, and inaccurately summarized messages. However, perhaps unfortunately, Spreen confirmed that Apple Intelligence's summary was truthful in his case. The many other generative AI features coming to Apple devices in a few weeks might create equally surprising reactions. One new feature included with the update is Writing Tools, which automatically proofreads, adjusts, and rewrites text to fix mistakes or change the sender's tone. It works across notes, messages, emails, and other apps. Apple Intelligence will also make Siri behave more like ChatGPT by responding to natural language prompts and helping users organize a device's data. A later update will enable Siri to optionally request help from ChatGPT. Additionally, users will be able to make AI-based edits to photos and search for them using natural language queries. This major update is expected to launch on October 28, bringing Apple Intelligence to the iPhone 15 Pro, all iPhone 16 models, and every M series iPad. Later updates will add AI generated emojis, generated cartoon images, advanced sketching features for the Notes app, automatic email sorting, and additional languages. These and other features might appear in iOS 18.2, 18.3, or 18.4.