I've had the Pebble Time for about a year and really appreciate it.
First, the fact that its "E-paper" display is always on means it works well as an old-fashioned watch so I can instantly tell the time. (I still find it crazy that the Apple Watch display is off by default!)
Pebble's notification support works really well with Android so I can see at a glance whether a new email or WhatsApp message is something I need to respond to on my phone. Most of the time I don't, so I spend less time fiddling with my phone.
The feature that I most appreciate that I hadn't anticipated is that the Pebble vibrates and shows who's calling when someone calls me. Which means I can keep my phone on silent all the time but never miss a phone call.
So I'm definitely a fan of the Pebble Time. Its UI is really simple and well thought out, especially compared to the Apple Watch, and there's really nothing else I need it to do, apart perhaps from being more physically attractive.
I really hope Pebble can take advantage of the swelling backlash against the overly complicated and 'feature'-ridden watches put out by Apple and other Android manufacturers, rather than be caught up in it. They got right pretty much first time around the minimal set of things you actually want to use a smart-watch for, and haven't swayed from this principal over their various iterations. I had one of the first KS originals, and have worn it, then my Time, almost every day since I got it.
Pebble seems to have nailed 'wearable', something you forget about but is quite handy. I setup my Pebble Time in a way it can be used without a phone. Ok smart messages are handy to glance on your wrist but are not essential and perhaps even detrimental (they frequently disrupt the moment). If necessary I can get a week of battery life from it, I use a watchface that shows me a 24 clock with sunrise and sunset and a line where we are now. It has an offline calendar, tasklist, weight tracking, daily steps, expenses, 7+ minute workout exercises, timers for napping or meditation, games like chess or 2048, a compass to stay on course, various dice type rollers for portable solo board games, fitcat, planetarium and stellarium, calculator, moodtracker, sleeptracker, game of life... and it's UI is fast! It would be nice if I could connect a wearable keyboard or frogpad for navigation, could use database apps... but for bigger apps I can use my android based e-reader or my bullet journal
This is how I feel about my LG Urbane android watch. The battery lasts three days, the notifications are great, the turn by turn nav is great, screen is always on, great performance, etc. I paid about $100 more than you, but I do get a nice color screen as opposed to the e-paper display, which is nice. I really don't like the look of e-paper and frankly, OLED isn't that great either. I suspect a mirasol-like display will eventually be the future for wearables. I also do not bother with watch apps. No one is pointing a gun at your head to install and use watch apps. Its perfectly fine to use a AW device for its basic functionality.
I think the idea that all watches need to be charged nightly and are a pain to use just isn't true anymore. Its a shame the Moto 360 and the Apple Watch became the first big e-watches. In retrospect, they were both fairly poor efforts, especially in terms of battery life.
I've had my Pebble Time for about six months now and really like it (previously lifelong owners of basic $25 Timex watches). It does what I want and isn't overly complicated.
Mainly got it because the 6s+ is just too big for my pockets so ends up being left on the desk (at work) or counter (at home) a lot more than the 5s I had and I wanted to get notifications for various apps/calls for these times.
It's actually a low power memory LCD on the Time, not e-paper like the OG. The notifications and caller ID features are great, and being able to control the media player on my phone is very useful when I'm on the bike.
I think they strayed from the path with Round because it sacrificed so much battery life. It looks like Pebble 2 is going to be 7-10 days again though.
I was a former hater and said I'd never buy one but recently won a Apple Watch Sport purely by chance. I tried it out and gave it an objective look, if I didn't like it then I'd sell it. After the initial neat factor, I don't remember to wear it every day (this is probably more me not remembering to wear it and less a conscious decision. But the scenario when I do make it a point to wear is when I'm traveling or on a road trip.
The killer app was driving with the Apple Watch (not what I would have expected). I found the GPS vibrating prompts, a glance at the watch for next turn really awesome features and I try not to drive anywhere unfamiliar without it. This is one area that's super subtle but really well thought out.
Again useful during driving, I also found the ability to skip music with my hands still on the steering wheel to be incredibly helpful. Feels safer than taking my eyes off the road to fumble my phone.
Would I pay for the next Apple Watch? Maybe. But I definitely no longer consider myself an Apple Watch hater.
That still does not sound it would validate to investment? A 10 dollar bluetooth earplug does not vibrate but aurally guides you. And at least on my car (2016 C-Class) after pairing you can skips songs via the steering wheel.
I sold my Apple Watch a few months ago, but I thoroughly enjoyed this feature. It would subtly vibrate just before you needed to turn and with kids making noise in the car, the vibration was better than listening for "turn now!".
I now have a Microsoft Band 2 and with Google Maps I get the same functionality, so it turns out I didn't lose anything by selling my Apple Watch.
"Again useful during driving, I also found the ability to skip music with my hands still on the steering wheel to be incredibly helpful."
I feel like that's significantly less important nowadays, with literally every single new car offering bluetooth connectivity and music controls directly on the wheel, you can use them without even looking.
Really? I found having my watch constantly buzzing on the steering wheel incredibly jarring. There is no substitute for a dashboard mount - directions should be a quick visual scan away, not a "let me take my hand off the wheel, raise my watch, scroll down to the dismiss button, and press it." Google Maps was the first set of notifications I disabled, with vigorous prejudice.
I'm surprised that hardly anyone is mentioning the activity wheel. That's the killer feature as far as I'm concerned. I don't know much about the science behind it, like if filling your activity wheel actually means you are doing a somewhat good job at being healthy, but I know that my settings are definitely keeping me more consistently active than I would by default otherwise. It's a key part of my life now, and I've filled that damned wheel about 95% of the days that I've owned the watch. Given that I'm not sure I would have improved my habits without it, I feel like it has definitely improved my life.
Other things that the watch has been a nice addition for - checking the weather over the next few hours by spinning the dial is very convenient. Receiving/reading messages while the phone isn't out.
The rest of it, not so much. The watch could be better at showing the time when you want to see it; I often have to tap the face. I rarely use Siri. I ignore calendar/mail entirely, phone works better. I dislike Apple Maps and use Google Maps instead. I could theoretically be in the market for a smaller/slimmer Apple fitness device.
> checking the weather over the next few hours by spinning the dial is very convenient
Holy shit I have no idea why I never thought to do that, that's a great feature.
I agree that the watch is not a life changing tech upgrade like the iPhone was, but personally, I find the features on the watch that I do use to be convenient and compelling enough that I still put the watch on every morning.
Really, the killer feature I want is disable the god damn screenshot feature on the watch, or at least give me a button in the photos app to "purge all watch screenshots" because fully half of my photo library is accidental watch screenshots, and I haven't had the time to come up with a way to script it.
Oh yes, and apple pay when a vendor accepts it is just down right awesome.
I'm surprised that hardly anyone is mentioning the activity wheel. That's the killer feature as far as I'm concerned.
If it does what I think it does, Garmin, Suunto and others have the same "killer feature" (in which case one should wonder, what is that feature killing? Not Apple's competitors.) Pebble doesn't, last time I fired my up a few weeks ago.
Other things that the watch has been a nice addition for - checking the weather over the next few hours by spinning the dial is very convenient.
A button push on my Garmin. One long push on Pebble, if you've set it up for that. Pebble has watch faces that show weather all the time. Haven't looked, but I'd be surprised if someone didn't do the same for Garmins.
The watch could be better at showing the time when you want to see it; I often have to tap the face.
This is where I think that Apple failed miserably. It's the main reason that I, as an iOS/Mac developer and all-around fanboy, didn't even consider the Apple Watch when it came out. Wanna know the time with a Garmin or a Pebble (or a Suunto, or just about any other smartwatch out there)? Want it to work every...single...time? Turn your wrist until the watch is in your line of sight. You'll see the time, guaranteed. (Caveat: if it's dark, might have to hit the backlight button. Though the Garmin on my wrist will light up at night when I turn my wrist with about 95% success.)
It's not for everyone. I agree that trying to put real apps on the thing was clearly done too early. But for me, the weather widget, GPS prompts, silent and unmissable notifications (and good integration on some apps like PagerDuty where I can Ack a page from the notification itself, no waiting on an app to launch or pulling out and unlocking my phone), and quick timer setiing (I use this multiple times almost every day--to remind myself to rotate laundry or check on what I'm cooking or all sorts of other tricks to help keep my ADHD brain on track) all combine to make something that has improved my life at the margins. I hadn't worn a watch in 20 years but Apple came up with one that was worth wearing to me.
But a few fundamental flaws of the watch suffice to explain 95% of the issues: the watch is too slow to act as a speedy alternative to your phone; the user interface is too fiddly to use on the move; the notification model is too limited to do anything other than encourage you to pull out your phone repeatedly; and Siri sucks.
I was an Apple Watch naysayer until I bought one. Now I like it (I don't love it) but it's a useful addition. I disagree about the notification model. It means I can look at a message and decide whether it's important and for short responses reply from the watch.
I'm an Apple Watch user. I like it, but it was expensive when I bought it (the AUD/USD exchange rate isn't favourable). For the utility I get out of it (health tracking, quick iMessage replies, turn-by-turn directions, weather and stocks at-a-glance) I think it's a three star product based on the original price.
And Apple Pay support in Australia is ... lacklustre. We only just got one bank behind it. If my bank supported Apple Pay it might be four stars.
If it were half the price (closer to ~AU$330), it would be five stars.
Dammit smartwatch industry, this isn't rocket science. The core values a watch brings are time on your wrist, notifications, and low maintenance. The core upgrades are simple apps (stopwatch, timer... ), waterproof-ness, and fashion.
Those are your dimensions. If you do anything that compromises those product fundamentals, you are making a bad decision.
If Pebble came out with a good looking, waterproof watch with a week long battery, they would dominate the market. The fact that they have done so well against the marketing juggernaut that is apple, is a tribute to how close they've come to these core product traits.
> If Pebble came out with a good looking, waterproof watch with a week long battery
I'm curious which one of those you think they currently aren't meeting, because they currently have the latter two, and the Pebble Time Round is a fairly attractive looking watch IMO.
I had a Pebble Steel and quite liked it but switched to the Apple Watch when it came up. I agree with some of the other points here:
* Apps suck 99% of the time
* Apps are slow
* The UI is hard to use (especially while moving)
* Siri is SLLLLOOOOOWWWWWWWWW
When siri does work it's awesome but I find myself just saying "Hey Siri" (to activate my phone) or holding down the home button for a second to activate it much more often. The watch is just too slow most of the time and nothing is more frustrating than telling it to do something, it failing, and then me having to go do it on my phone. Also when most people ask me about it I say "I like it but it's far too expensive for most people to justify, I even have a hard time self-justifiying it to myself now that I've had it". Notifications, weather, upcoming events, time, fitness/activity? All great and it's why I wear it daily but it's been months since I launched an app on it. I'll see where Apple goes with it but I'm very much so considering switching back to a Pebble Time or other Pebble device as they are cheaper.
So next time I take my watch off for less than a month I shall too write an article. Clearly the author didn't need a watch, but bought one anyway. Then as expected didn't use it. Less then a month of not wearing a watch, doesn't seem like long enough either as the watch doesn't do everything the phone does, so there's no need to wear it frequently unless you like having a watch, which is not the case here.
This article almost seems as clickbait... I could also write about how I bought a $500 coffee maker, and stopped using it after 9 months, because I actually don't drink much coffee. I just thought that having a nice coffee maker would improve my life.
Unfortunately for me, they'll never get past the fact that I appreciate watches for their movements. A watch is entirely an aesthetic choice -- you have to want their aesthetic.
I have a 50-year old Rolex Air King (way older than me, family heirloom) and I can't imagine switching to anything else anytime soon. It's simple, no-nonsense and a beautiful watch. I appreciate other, fancier watches and might wear something on the high end for a really posh event, but that's it.
I think most people are in agreement that the app launch speed is horrendous, that'll get better in time. For me the two best features has been the notifications and dark sky as a complication. A few other things I use on a pretty regular basis...
* Siri, set timer. (I just wish Siri was faster... it's pretty frustrating)
* Locate my phone, this has been a life saver. As someone who runs a lot of events, I have a tendency to just leave my phone on a table and forget about it.
* Having calls redirected to your wrist. This coincides with leaving my phone somewhere. Events are usually super loud so I wouldn't hear my phone anyways, but the pulsing vibration on the wrist is difficult to ignore.
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I purchased an Apple Watch for my mother who works in a more corporate setting with a shared desk. She's constantly on her feet and she has no pockets to keep her phone on her. The watch has been an incredible investment for her as she use to only check her phone during lunch and as she left for work. These days it's easier to get a hold of her in case of an emergency. When she's on the go, her phone is typically in her pursue, so you can imagine the benefit of the phone on her watch.
The Apple watch isn't for everyone, but there are certainly some people that benefit from it more than others.
I think a lot of this comes down to cost. A $500+ smartwatch that's mostly useful for notifications and the occasional wrist-based controls seems like overkill to me, personally (but I imagine this depends on your disposable gadget income).
But I picked up a Moto360 maybe a year and a half ago for $150 on sale and while its main uses have also been notifications, the occasional voice/tap command, and playing with making watch faces in Photoshop, I'm mostly OK with that.
$150 for a computer-watch that can change its appearance and layout to match your mood, occasion, or tie is pretty neat. But I don't know that it's $500 neat. Kinda like Travolta's $5 milk shake in Pulp Fiction, the Apple Watch is a pretty cool gadget, but I'm not sure it's something I'd ever pay that much for. But once you get into the $100-200 range, they start to become more appealing.
And once the tech works its way downstream into cheaper products the way basic smartphones have, I think they'll be fairly popular.
I had a similar experience to the writer of the article when my fitbit broke when an update bricked it (or perhaps 'braceletted' it?
In the weeks between getting the warranty repair, I began wearing the watch my grandad gave me before he passed away.
I found two things.
1. I didn't miss anything about the fitbit - the main thing I used it for was time, and the second most used feature - the step counter - wasn't used for much more than something of general interest. I didn't find that killer reason I needed the watch in my life, even though I live an active lifestyle.
2. I preferred wearing the old fashioned watch with sentimental value attached. A watch is so unique as it can be passed through generations and is worn daily by one person over a long period of time.
Given the premium real estate of my wrist meaning there is only one place for a device, I'd much rather have something there which is something very special and dear to me, than a gimmick.
As an "Apple Guy" and a "Watch Guy" the occasional friend will ask me why I don't own an Apple Watch. Your second point nails it. These machines are intimate, lasting. They spend more time with us than anything or anyone else. Simultaneous style, sentiment, and function with the added benefit that we can pass them on to our children and grandchildren.
I used a Pebble for about a year, but the problem to me is that it never really looks like a "watch", but more like a "computer that's on my wrist".
I'll admit that's a kind of pedantic little nitpick, and the Pebble is a great little thing, but I switched back to my old Invicta chronograph after awhile.
When the watch came out, I thought, "Oh that's neat. Not neat enough to buy, but neat." Eventually, I got a good discount on one and bought it.
While it may not be life changing, I love it. I use it daily and for lots of things. The reminders and notifications are extremely useful. Siri works great for me. I send texts from it, I set timers while cooking, I check the weather and time and next event I have scheduled. When getting dressed in the morning, I immediately notice when I don't have it on because it's become such a part of my life.
So I guess your mileage may vary. It turned out to be just what I was looking for without even realizing it.
I never thought I'd be one to own a smartwatch. I enjoy wearing traditional mechanical watches for quickly being able to tell the time as well as for the fashion aspect, owning a wearable that would tie to my phone, delivering notifications and giving me access to apps, didn't really appeal to me as I prefer to disconnect rather than hyperconnect to my devices.
Being someone who does a fair amount of outdoor activity (cycling and hiking mostly), and knowing a few people who are crazy about their Fitbits, I ended up looking into some fitness tracker-oriented smartwatches, landing on the Garmin Vivoactive HR with it's HR monitor and built in GPS. It's a very attractive device for $250, especially if fitness tracking and mapping your workout is important to you.
$250 is maybe the upper limit of what I'd want to spend on a smartwatch, but the Garmin has been great for me as a simple intuitive device that knows what it is good at and doesn't try to complicate itself.
Though you can cram a surprising amount of information and interactivity in these devices, it goes against good sustainable user experience to make a wrist-top computer as robust as a smartphone. Smartwatches should be a bundle of sensors and quick intuitive bits of display information, not a surrogate to my smartphone.
I just paid for snacks at my local, rural, small-business-run convenience store with my watch. Seamless. Apple Pay is another great reason to keep wearing the watch.
>But the most obvious alternative is to massively increase the amount of voice control the watch offers, and Apple simply doesn’t have the technical chops to do so. While Google and Amazon have been creating voice assistants that people seem to actually use and wax lyrical about, Apple … hasn’t.
Citation needed. Never found any of those assistants particularly impressive, never mind hearing anyone waxing lyrical about it.
>> "But the most obvious alternative is to massively increase the amount of voice control the watch offers, and Apple simply doesn’t have the technical chops to do so. While Google and Amazon have been creating voice assistants that people seem to actually use and wax lyrical about, Apple … hasn’t."
This passage from the article jumped out at me. Is he saying that voice recognition is the missing killer feature in an Apple Watch, whereas Android watches hold the promise of adding such a feature because Google (and, irrelevantly, Amazon) are better at it?
Without getting into a technical debate about which tech giants are ahead in voice recognition and its applications, I am interested in the notion of conversing with a smart watch.
The obvious application is to provide the time of day to a sight impaired person, or (more trivially) to someone driving a car or operating heavy machinery who can't glance down. Probably it could be programmed to guide the sight impaired down the street, buzz if you veer off the sidewalk, etc.
Even there, it's merely a peripheral to the smartphone which can do all of that and more.
My Moto 360 was purchased on a whim because it was on sale, and indeed I wear it infrequently on a whim, usually when going to a tech event or a conference that requires strict adherence to a schedule, and then only for its obvious geek value. It's fun, my daughter loves changing the watch faces, and occasionally it's even useful for discretely screening calls and texts.
I just keep thinking that some brilliant kid is going to stumble across a killer application for these watches, and then we'll be off to the races. Still scratching my head on this one, for now.
[+] [-] jbarham|9 years ago|reply
First, the fact that its "E-paper" display is always on means it works well as an old-fashioned watch so I can instantly tell the time. (I still find it crazy that the Apple Watch display is off by default!)
Pebble's notification support works really well with Android so I can see at a glance whether a new email or WhatsApp message is something I need to respond to on my phone. Most of the time I don't, so I spend less time fiddling with my phone.
The feature that I most appreciate that I hadn't anticipated is that the Pebble vibrates and shows who's calling when someone calls me. Which means I can keep my phone on silent all the time but never miss a phone call.
So I'm definitely a fan of the Pebble Time. Its UI is really simple and well thought out, especially compared to the Apple Watch, and there's really nothing else I need it to do, apart perhaps from being more physically attractive.
[+] [-] fredley|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fsiefken|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drzaiusapelord|9 years ago|reply
I think the idea that all watches need to be charged nightly and are a pain to use just isn't true anymore. Its a shame the Moto 360 and the Apple Watch became the first big e-watches. In retrospect, they were both fairly poor efforts, especially in terms of battery life.
[+] [-] thehoff|9 years ago|reply
Mainly got it because the 6s+ is just too big for my pockets so ends up being left on the desk (at work) or counter (at home) a lot more than the 5s I had and I wanted to get notifications for various apps/calls for these times.
[+] [-] taneq|9 years ago|reply
I think they strayed from the path with Round because it sacrificed so much battery life. It looks like Pebble 2 is going to be 7-10 days again though.
[+] [-] amelius|9 years ago|reply
This is funny because it was the Apple iPod that defeated other mp3 players by its simplicity.
[+] [-] samastur|9 years ago|reply
Obviously (my) taste is very much personal.
[+] [-] zodPod|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alttab|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toosmart4u12|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] gaius|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rubyfan|9 years ago|reply
The killer app was driving with the Apple Watch (not what I would have expected). I found the GPS vibrating prompts, a glance at the watch for next turn really awesome features and I try not to drive anywhere unfamiliar without it. This is one area that's super subtle but really well thought out.
Again useful during driving, I also found the ability to skip music with my hands still on the steering wheel to be incredibly helpful. Feels safer than taking my eyes off the road to fumble my phone.
Would I pay for the next Apple Watch? Maybe. But I definitely no longer consider myself an Apple Watch hater.
[+] [-] dionidium|9 years ago|reply
It's a sign of how broken and far behind automobile tech is that Alexa was first developed for the kitchen and not the car.
[+] [-] technofiend|9 years ago|reply
Well presumably you take one hand off the wheel or have a really long tongue?
[+] [-] jsemrau|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stonedge|9 years ago|reply
I now have a Microsoft Band 2 and with Google Maps I get the same functionality, so it turns out I didn't lose anything by selling my Apple Watch.
[+] [-] gambiting|9 years ago|reply
I feel like that's significantly less important nowadays, with literally every single new car offering bluetooth connectivity and music controls directly on the wheel, you can use them without even looking.
[+] [-] superuser2|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Shivetya|9 years ago|reply
I can have my phone talk to me when driving and tell me when to turn. There are so many mounts available I can put it anywhere.
Besides, if its killer app is GPS there is something seriously wrong with other apps then.
Me, when it becomes my phone I will be happy. As in, when its not a slave device.
[+] [-] tunesmith|9 years ago|reply
Other things that the watch has been a nice addition for - checking the weather over the next few hours by spinning the dial is very convenient. Receiving/reading messages while the phone isn't out.
The rest of it, not so much. The watch could be better at showing the time when you want to see it; I often have to tap the face. I rarely use Siri. I ignore calendar/mail entirely, phone works better. I dislike Apple Maps and use Google Maps instead. I could theoretically be in the market for a smaller/slimmer Apple fitness device.
[+] [-] eric_h|9 years ago|reply
Holy shit I have no idea why I never thought to do that, that's a great feature.
I agree that the watch is not a life changing tech upgrade like the iPhone was, but personally, I find the features on the watch that I do use to be convenient and compelling enough that I still put the watch on every morning.
Really, the killer feature I want is disable the god damn screenshot feature on the watch, or at least give me a button in the photos app to "purge all watch screenshots" because fully half of my photo library is accidental watch screenshots, and I haven't had the time to come up with a way to script it.
Oh yes, and apple pay when a vendor accepts it is just down right awesome.
[+] [-] mikestew|9 years ago|reply
If it does what I think it does, Garmin, Suunto and others have the same "killer feature" (in which case one should wonder, what is that feature killing? Not Apple's competitors.) Pebble doesn't, last time I fired my up a few weeks ago.
Other things that the watch has been a nice addition for - checking the weather over the next few hours by spinning the dial is very convenient.
A button push on my Garmin. One long push on Pebble, if you've set it up for that. Pebble has watch faces that show weather all the time. Haven't looked, but I'd be surprised if someone didn't do the same for Garmins.
The watch could be better at showing the time when you want to see it; I often have to tap the face.
This is where I think that Apple failed miserably. It's the main reason that I, as an iOS/Mac developer and all-around fanboy, didn't even consider the Apple Watch when it came out. Wanna know the time with a Garmin or a Pebble (or a Suunto, or just about any other smartwatch out there)? Want it to work every...single...time? Turn your wrist until the watch is in your line of sight. You'll see the time, guaranteed. (Caveat: if it's dark, might have to hit the backlight button. Though the Garmin on my wrist will light up at night when I turn my wrist with about 95% success.)
[+] [-] skywhopper|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jgrahamc|9 years ago|reply
I was an Apple Watch naysayer until I bought one. Now I like it (I don't love it) but it's a useful addition. I disagree about the notification model. It means I can look at a message and decide whether it's important and for short responses reply from the watch.
[+] [-] taspeotis|9 years ago|reply
And Apple Pay support in Australia is ... lacklustre. We only just got one bank behind it. If my bank supported Apple Pay it might be four stars.
If it were half the price (closer to ~AU$330), it would be five stars.
[+] [-] ohthehugemanate|9 years ago|reply
Those are your dimensions. If you do anything that compromises those product fundamentals, you are making a bad decision.
If Pebble came out with a good looking, waterproof watch with a week long battery, they would dominate the market. The fact that they have done so well against the marketing juggernaut that is apple, is a tribute to how close they've come to these core product traits.
[+] [-] delecti|9 years ago|reply
I'm curious which one of those you think they currently aren't meeting, because they currently have the latter two, and the Pebble Time Round is a fairly attractive looking watch IMO.
[+] [-] joshstrange|9 years ago|reply
* Apps suck 99% of the time
* Apps are slow
* The UI is hard to use (especially while moving)
* Siri is SLLLLOOOOOWWWWWWWWW
When siri does work it's awesome but I find myself just saying "Hey Siri" (to activate my phone) or holding down the home button for a second to activate it much more often. The watch is just too slow most of the time and nothing is more frustrating than telling it to do something, it failing, and then me having to go do it on my phone. Also when most people ask me about it I say "I like it but it's far too expensive for most people to justify, I even have a hard time self-justifiying it to myself now that I've had it". Notifications, weather, upcoming events, time, fitness/activity? All great and it's why I wear it daily but it's been months since I launched an app on it. I'll see where Apple goes with it but I'm very much so considering switching back to a Pebble Time or other Pebble device as they are cheaper.
[+] [-] spyspy|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] melling|9 years ago|reply
Your Watch, or a better version of it, could monitor your sleep.
https://blog.cardiogr.am/what-do-normal-and-abnormal-heart-r...
"It’s that smartwatches are a solution in search of a problem."
Also not true. Health and safety are a huge reason most people will be wearing a smartwatch, or wearable, in the future:
https://h4labs.wordpress.com/2015/07/28/in-the-future-everyo...
[+] [-] dfar1|9 years ago|reply
This article almost seems as clickbait... I could also write about how I bought a $500 coffee maker, and stopped using it after 9 months, because I actually don't drink much coffee. I just thought that having a nice coffee maker would improve my life.
[+] [-] busterarm|9 years ago|reply
I have a 50-year old Rolex Air King (way older than me, family heirloom) and I can't imagine switching to anything else anytime soon. It's simple, no-nonsense and a beautiful watch. I appreciate other, fancier watches and might wear something on the high end for a really posh event, but that's it.
[+] [-] rickyc091|9 years ago|reply
* Siri, set timer. (I just wish Siri was faster... it's pretty frustrating) * Locate my phone, this has been a life saver. As someone who runs a lot of events, I have a tendency to just leave my phone on a table and forget about it. * Having calls redirected to your wrist. This coincides with leaving my phone somewhere. Events are usually super loud so I wouldn't hear my phone anyways, but the pulsing vibration on the wrist is difficult to ignore.
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I purchased an Apple Watch for my mother who works in a more corporate setting with a shared desk. She's constantly on her feet and she has no pockets to keep her phone on her. The watch has been an incredible investment for her as she use to only check her phone during lunch and as she left for work. These days it's easier to get a hold of her in case of an emergency. When she's on the go, her phone is typically in her pursue, so you can imagine the benefit of the phone on her watch.
The Apple watch isn't for everyone, but there are certainly some people that benefit from it more than others.
[+] [-] soylentcola|9 years ago|reply
But I picked up a Moto360 maybe a year and a half ago for $150 on sale and while its main uses have also been notifications, the occasional voice/tap command, and playing with making watch faces in Photoshop, I'm mostly OK with that.
$150 for a computer-watch that can change its appearance and layout to match your mood, occasion, or tie is pretty neat. But I don't know that it's $500 neat. Kinda like Travolta's $5 milk shake in Pulp Fiction, the Apple Watch is a pretty cool gadget, but I'm not sure it's something I'd ever pay that much for. But once you get into the $100-200 range, they start to become more appealing.
And once the tech works its way downstream into cheaper products the way basic smartphones have, I think they'll be fairly popular.
[+] [-] gloves|9 years ago|reply
In the weeks between getting the warranty repair, I began wearing the watch my grandad gave me before he passed away.
I found two things. 1. I didn't miss anything about the fitbit - the main thing I used it for was time, and the second most used feature - the step counter - wasn't used for much more than something of general interest. I didn't find that killer reason I needed the watch in my life, even though I live an active lifestyle.
2. I preferred wearing the old fashioned watch with sentimental value attached. A watch is so unique as it can be passed through generations and is worn daily by one person over a long period of time. Given the premium real estate of my wrist meaning there is only one place for a device, I'd much rather have something there which is something very special and dear to me, than a gimmick.
[+] [-] whitehouse3|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tombert|9 years ago|reply
I'll admit that's a kind of pedantic little nitpick, and the Pebble is a great little thing, but I switched back to my old Invicta chronograph after awhile.
[+] [-] pinaceae|9 years ago|reply
It sucks at being a watch.
I can check my Casio without flicking my wrist. I can even take it off and place it next to my keyboard and keep track of the time.
Not possible on the Apple Watch, even more infuriating by the inconsistent detection of the wrist movement.
The Apple Watch is a watch that sucks at being - a watch.
[+] [-] vitd|9 years ago|reply
While it may not be life changing, I love it. I use it daily and for lots of things. The reminders and notifications are extremely useful. Siri works great for me. I send texts from it, I set timers while cooking, I check the weather and time and next event I have scheduled. When getting dressed in the morning, I immediately notice when I don't have it on because it's become such a part of my life.
So I guess your mileage may vary. It turned out to be just what I was looking for without even realizing it.
[+] [-] dmschulman|9 years ago|reply
Being someone who does a fair amount of outdoor activity (cycling and hiking mostly), and knowing a few people who are crazy about their Fitbits, I ended up looking into some fitness tracker-oriented smartwatches, landing on the Garmin Vivoactive HR with it's HR monitor and built in GPS. It's a very attractive device for $250, especially if fitness tracking and mapping your workout is important to you.
$250 is maybe the upper limit of what I'd want to spend on a smartwatch, but the Garmin has been great for me as a simple intuitive device that knows what it is good at and doesn't try to complicate itself.
Though you can cram a surprising amount of information and interactivity in these devices, it goes against good sustainable user experience to make a wrist-top computer as robust as a smartphone. Smartwatches should be a bundle of sensors and quick intuitive bits of display information, not a surrogate to my smartphone.
[+] [-] RobotfromOT|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] coldtea|9 years ago|reply
Citation needed. Never found any of those assistants particularly impressive, never mind hearing anyone waxing lyrical about it.
[+] [-] blisterpeanuts|9 years ago|reply
This passage from the article jumped out at me. Is he saying that voice recognition is the missing killer feature in an Apple Watch, whereas Android watches hold the promise of adding such a feature because Google (and, irrelevantly, Amazon) are better at it?
Without getting into a technical debate about which tech giants are ahead in voice recognition and its applications, I am interested in the notion of conversing with a smart watch.
The obvious application is to provide the time of day to a sight impaired person, or (more trivially) to someone driving a car or operating heavy machinery who can't glance down. Probably it could be programmed to guide the sight impaired down the street, buzz if you veer off the sidewalk, etc.
Even there, it's merely a peripheral to the smartphone which can do all of that and more.
My Moto 360 was purchased on a whim because it was on sale, and indeed I wear it infrequently on a whim, usually when going to a tech event or a conference that requires strict adherence to a schedule, and then only for its obvious geek value. It's fun, my daughter loves changing the watch faces, and occasionally it's even useful for discretely screening calls and texts.
I just keep thinking that some brilliant kid is going to stumble across a killer application for these watches, and then we'll be off to the races. Still scratching my head on this one, for now.
[+] [-] sickbeard|9 years ago|reply