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Assorted CES Gizmos
Frank Buckheimer writes "The CES 2003 show in Las Vegas will give us some pretty nice introductions of some brand new products." Other submitters sent in news about a "Mini PC" the size of a paperback book, and a spiffy digital sound projector. mbstone writes "Bill Gates announced a line of MS wristwatches that receive email, stock quotes, sports scores, etc. by FM radio. Gates claims it's a 'whole new product concept that was completely incubated by Microsoft Research,' but it's really just a reprise of the Seiko MessageWatch -- mine became just a watch, sans atomic time, as of 12/31/99 when Seiko called it quits. Once bitten, twice shy. Has anybody proposed an open standard for such gadgets so that new wristwatch-data-service providers can enter the market when the old provider leaves?"
> Vulcan hopes it will attract mobile computer-users willing to
> pay for wirelessly transmitted movie trailers and other content
Is there no point at which shame kicks in? Who where these people raised by? While I do realize that some people will pay $10 for a movie they don't intend to see just to see an anticipated trailer preceding it, $1500 for trailers seems just a tad over the top. Like there is nothing else well-heeled geeks could do with a wireless computer except watch trailers--TRAILERS, mind you, not movies. Because we certainly couldn't bring ourselves to invite global piracy and the resulting collapse of society by offering actual movies online.
The data will be beamed over FM radio airwaves to the gadgets, wherever they are. Consumers will pay $120 to $300 for the watches and perhaps $99 more a year for the data service.
Once the frequency is know, anyone with a shortwave will be able to pick-up the information. Of course MS could have it sent digitized and encrypted, but how long until that gets hacked? Could this be the precursor to DRM for radio?
Unless you are a student, wristwatches are wholly unnecessary and a matter of preference
Or if you don't have a cell phone/pager/whatever.
When I was tied to a pager I stopped wearing my wristwatch... it was just as convienent to look at the pager really.
I don't need one now, and I won't carry one by choice. Ditto for a cell phone. Maybe if I could eliminate my land line, but since I have DSL that's not an option.
Somebody at Microsoft is smoking crack to think that people would wear a Microsoft watch
While I wouldn't, and obviously you wouldn't, that doesn't mean nobody would. Frankly, the average Joe doesn't think of MS as an evil corporation since MS does a lot of spin control. A lot of people with more money than sense will see this and think "oooh! Nifty!".
And about a year down the road it'll get piled with the various PDAs and other gizmos that last made them say "oooh! Nifty!".