Smart Watches

[limpid]

With the omate you don't need a phone as will. It's a phone in its own right.

There's little point in explaining though. You've said elsewhere the you'll be getting an iPhone 6 when you have no idea of what it'll be. You'll probably get the idea once apple invent iwatches.

[dont_do_it_doug.]

With the omate you don't need a phone as will. It's a phone in its own right.

There's little point in explaining though. You've said elsewhere the you'll be getting an iPhone 6 when you have no idea of what it'll be. You'll probably get the idea once apple invent iwatches.

Eh? Bit tetchy.

I actually said I'll be waiting for the 6 before I upgrade. This is in massive part down to the timing of my upgrade cycle. If it turns out to be a pile of muck I'll get something else. Though at least unlike many other manufacturers (Samsung being the prime example) it's guaranteed to be different.

I'm no fan boy. I hate macs for example, I find them counter intuitive. I just happen to prefer iOS to android.

What this watch malarkey has to do with my mobile habits I've no idea.

[Davkaus]

I might be tempted by a smartwatch when someone comes up with a design that doesn't look like a Casio from the 1980s. They all look tacky as ****.

[BOF]

I can't see the point of one. What will it do that a phone won't? But on a smaller screen. Or am I missing something?

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

I'll be interested when they start doing shit like this

 

[The_Rev]

People couldn't see the point of smartphones five years ago, now everybody has one.   I dare say the same will happen with watches over the next half decade. Don't make a judgement call on the first generation of products. 

[Risso]

People couldn't see the point of smartphones five years ago, now everybody has one.   I dare say the same will happen with watches over the next half decade. Don't make a judgement call on the first generation of products. 

 

What people were they?!  Surely everybody wanted the internet and all the other stuff on their mobile?  I remember when it was first mooted that you'd be able to watch video on 3G devices, I can't remember anybody thinking "what's the point of that".  The success of smartphones is that they combine the phone with mobile internet, music and games, which until smartphones came along meant having a separate phone, mp3 player and Gameboy etc.  I'm with DDID, I honestly can't see the point of them, however flash they get.

[BOF]

I'm with DDID, I honestly can't see the point of them, however flash they get.

You mean me? :-)

[BOF]

People couldn't see the point of smartphones five years ago, now everybody has one. I dare say the same will happen with watches over the next half decade. Don't make a judgement call on the first generation of products.

As Risso says, the point and purpose of smartphones was obvious. But the smartwatch is coming into a world that already has the smartphone. That's why I asked if I'm missing something. It's been known to happen :-)

[limpid]

It's an alternative. A choice if you will. It's new and shiny. The Omate will be me second generation of Smartwatch and Apple haven't even invented them yet.

[BOF]

OK so it's a choice with, presumably, a much smaller screen?

[limpid]

Yep. Although I suspect I'll be carrying a phone and wearing the watch. This might change with Glass; if the screen is adequate I might scrap the phone.

Glass + smartwatch will give you what CED asks for above, but without having to hold your wrist like that.

[Risso]

I don't get the watch as a phone thing.  Do you have to hold it up to your ear?

[limpid]

The Omate is a speakerphone and has bluetooth. I can't speak for others. I suspect less than 5% of my time interacting with my phone is related to calls.

... and Glass has speakers and mics.

[Risso]

Fair enough.  I had one of the old square mini ipods, and I got a watch strap that it clipped into.  There were things like going for a run that made that much more convenient than a phone in a case.

[CVByrne]

I don't get it either. A watch is there to tell the time and be essentially jewellery that a man can wear. I don't see the purpose of it serving as an extension to my phone. I understand what it does but can't see the real merits in it. I can see the drawbacks though. You've got some geeky watch on your wrist. We all need a phone but we all don't need a watch that's an extension to it.

[limpid]

The Omate is not an "extension". It's a smart phone in its own right.

[CVByrne]

People couldn't see the point of smartphones five years ago, now everybody has one.   I dare say the same will happen with watches over the next half decade. Don't make a judgement call on the first generation of products. 

 

 

Totally untrue. The point of them was obvious, internet, the full internet not WAP on a phone. The problem was it took until 2009 and really 2010 before the devices were of the standard to make their price worth it. 

 

But a smartwatch will be either a phone as Limpid said, which means it is now an utterly useless one as it has a tiny screen which can't be used for the internet at all really. Or it becomes an extension of your phone, in which case it's just to save you time taking your phone out to change a track or read a text, which for the vast majority of people I don't see as really anything more than unnecessary. 

 

I think what Chris Ziegler on the Verge wrote a month or two ago makes sense. If real watch makers partner with say Google or whoever to put smartwatch functionality into a watch designed by them, then it will probably be a big thing. How or what that will look like who knows. But I'm thinking it's a watch that the glass sudden;y becomes a screen when a message etc.. comes in. 

 

But at the end of the day a watch is there to look good and tell the time both of which are more important than saving you time taking your phone out to do what it's in your pocket to do.

Edited October 2, 2013 by CVByrne

[limpid]

I thought you stopped following the Verge. Why do I care how big the watch screen is when I'll have Glass?

[CVByrne]

I don't read their reviews. I still listen to their podcasts and check the site for tech news like I do lots of sites. Revies are a trifecta of Engadget, Techradar and Anandtech.

 

Anyway, sure you can go around with Google Glass and and an accompaning watch. But the internet is the internet and it's going to be best on smatphones for a long long time.

 

Glass and smartwatches will not boom like mobile phones and then smartphones did. Smarphones were the natural progression to replace mobile phones. So their success was obvious.

 

People who don't wear watches for various reasons, like not liking something on your wrist etc.. to convince those people to wear one is vastly different to getting them to swap their Nokia for a touchscreen Smartphone.

 

Then as I said, vast amount of watch wearing people have no interest having a watch that is like a mini smartphone. The technology in the watch hasn't much changed in 100 years. It's not there to do anything but tell time accurately, look nice and most importantly last a very very long time.

 

It's a hard sell to get people to wear glasses with a computer screen projected on your eye when everyone who wears glasses hates them. It's also a hard sell to get the watches onto peoples wrists who don't wear them for a reason or onto the wrists of people wearing watches already.  

 

I think wearable tech will be a success to a degree, but nothing even close to mobile phones and smartphones. Which will be a booming industry for decades.