It was clear that one of the main protagonists of this MWC 2024 will be generative Artificial Intelligence integrated into all types of devices. This is the great trend of the times and it makes sense. Perhaps what we didn’t expect was to see (even though it was announced a few days before the fair). An approach where everything is entrusted to an assistant, like a smartphone without an app like this chatbots what we are used to seeing.

Deutsche Telekom’s proposal aims to envision a future where applications become meaningless in favor of a single artificial intelligence that understands us and responds to our needs.

Better theory than practice

We managed to get hold of this terminal (an adapted telco T-Phone). stop You will see that the operator was at MWC and thus learned first-hand how this paradigm shift was proposed.

On the one hand can execute Stable DiffusionAn artificial intelligence engine designed to create images from text. The idea is not so much quickRather, it can recognize the images in our gallery and make edits on them.

For example, if we want to fix a distorted photo, there will be no content in the corners and it is normal that we have to sacrifice some areas of the image. With this solution, we were able to artificially fill these empty spaces so as not to narrow the photo area.

This integration of Stable Diffusion, although we have not seen it in recent smartphones so far, is technically possible in many (those with Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 or Mediatek Dimensity 9300 chips), but manufacturers do not implement it. .

The Stable Diffusion demo took half a second to render this car image. Image: Xataka.

Now let’s move on to the big promise of this device: replacing apps with your own chatbot. In fact, it is a pure aid like the ones we are used to using. But instead of being another option in the terminal, it is the only possible way.

For example, instead of opening Amazon and searching for “racquets,” we ask it for the racquets because we want to buy one, and it will show us the results for that product on Amazon. It is true that from here it is more conversational: we can ask questions about these results, or requests such as what material one of them is made of, or we can only ask it to show results under 200 euros.

The same goes for more general requests, like a list of gift ideas or suggestions to take a ten-day vacation. We can improve upon what we gain from their answers.

“Recommend a gift for my son who loves tennis.” Responses to the request Image: Xataka.

First of all, the AI ​​Phone is still a carrier phone. Image: Xataka.

This is a curiosity, and in a way it is progress, but It’s hard to think of a scenario that would eliminate apps in favor of assistants, which are a great accessory for our phone, but not so perfect that we forget about the applications.

Certainly, apps have been one of the biggest drivers of the mobile industry over the last fifteen years. They have evolved from being a form of software distribution to an industry in their own right – reaching half a trillion dollars in global turnover by 2022 – and they have done so by combining utilities and functions that make them useful and convenient. Future expectations continue to speak of sustainable growth.

It might make sense to ask an assistant about rackets and then narrow down the request until we find one that’s acceptable, but in most cases what we’ll want is to access gardens controlled by an app and take advantage of certain functions of the app.

Now we will see how this proposal will develop, if it is capable of improving the experience (let’s not forget that we are faced with a first version that is not even commercial) and whether it can count on sufficient support. But we still have a lot of work to do before we forget about the apps. Even resorting to something as interesting as artificial intelligence.

in Xataka | I tested the generative AI of the Xiaomi 14 Ultra. I don’t know if I love him or if he scares me

Featured image | Xataka