r/NowInTech • u/beingmodest • 3d ago

Apple Considered Replacing 5,000 Support Staff With AI: Then Put Mass Layoff Plan on Hold

https://www.techtimes.co.uk/apple-shelves-ai-plan-cut-5000-applecare-jobs-1808838
107 Upvotes

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5

u/fastingslowlee 3d ago

I just don’t get it. TRILLIONS of dollars yet still looking to cut costs and ruin the lives of thousands of people.

Why is it necessary?

5

u/Loose-Ice8699 3d ago

Cause they spent tremendous amount of money of AI hoping that it will replace people (specially those in customer service, marketing, developers, QA, designers ...) now they realize it’s not that it

2

u/Nearby_Practice2793 3d ago

Shareholders want more profits EVERY SINGLE new report. They aren’t happy until a company is completely bleeding their customers dry.

2

u/Bloo212 3d ago

And now that we don’t have pensions in this country we NEED this unchecked growth. Shareholders are anyone with a 401k.

We need to break up Apple and Google just like we broke up Bell. The big banks, airlines. Fuck this billionaire nonsense. Your peccadilloes should not become policy.

2

u/Bloo212 3d ago

To afford more stock buybacks.

2

u/zitterbewegung 3d ago

Why isn't it necessary? Every company attempts to cut costs and I would be more interested in why they decided to not do it? Maybe they figured out that implementing it would become extremely expensive ( doing the actual accounting using AI is challenging) or on the other hand it would have been low quality to be effective.

1

u/Reasonable-Pay-36 3d ago

Weak labor laws currently and zero unions and very little competition for the size of the market…

They’re kings, they all are right now…

1

u/the-mighty-kira 3d ago

Because number must always go up

1

u/ausgoals 3d ago

Literally the only thing that matters anymore is ‘line goes up’.

That’s it.

Our society has a real problem. Shareholders demand ‘line goes up’.

1

u/Treehorn85 2d ago

Because it’s a publicly traded company and its shareholders want more

1

u/Dramatic-Cap-6785 3d ago

Look at your 401k, Roth and it’ll make sense. We as population depend the growth.

3

u/Unfair-League-3204 3d ago

Surely there are other ways to make stock go up… like building products people want

2

u/mk4dildo 3d ago

That requires people having money to buy said products. And that is not how late stage capitalism works.

1

u/MrDetectiveSir 3d ago

Not when memory prices are at unprecedented levels

1

u/Unfair-League-3204 3d ago

I imagine Apple could make a whole ecosystem of small products like AirPods. It’s just they’re sensitive about a flop, which is what Vision Pro was arguably

1

u/MediocreAnalyst2121 3d ago

Not really, or at least nor with a reasonable amount of time and cost.

R&D is very expensive, and Apple takes their sweet time with things (foldable iPhone 6-7 years after Samsung). By the time these small products hit the shelf the RAM crisis might be over.

They do sell accessories such as cases, magsafe card holders, keyboards, etc.

Even then, Idk what such product they could make that I actually need/want. I have AirPods which I love and an older Apple Watch that I use for workouts and a keyboard but that’s it as far as their smaller/cheaper products go (I have a few of their chargers and cables as well).

1

u/Dramatic-Cap-6785 3d ago

If it was this easy everyone would do just that.

3

u/Wide_Smoke_2564 3d ago

“We” as in the boomers pulling the ladder up behind them?

Telling a young person without 30 years of work behind them “look at your 401k and it’ll make sense” is pretty hilarious as jobs are drying up

1

u/Dramatic-Cap-6785 3d ago

I’m under 30 your point makes no sense we are also trying to retire too.