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Can Even Apple Make a Watch Insanely Smart?
theodp writes "Throwing some cold water on the buzz surrounding the Galaxy Gear Smartwatch launch, The New Yorker's Matt Buchanan questions how smart a watch can really be. Calling offerings like the Galaxy Gear useful but not the stuff of dreams and revolutions, Buchanan writes, 'So there remains a strange undercurrent of hope that somebody-Apple-will figure out, soon, some grander vision for wearable technology, transforming it from something that people have vaguely imagined into something people intensely desire. It did it for smartphones, once, and again, for tablets. The question that Apple has been charged with, since nobody has definitively answered it yet, is whether the lack of an invention that truly carries us beyond the last five hundred years of wrist-mounted technology is the result of a failure of imagination or simply a fact of nature-that a watch will always just be a watch, no matter how smart it might think it is.' So, will you be an early adopter and drink Samsung's or Sony's smartwatch Kool-Aid, wait to see what Apple comes up with, or hold out for a Windows Forearm Pad 8?"
I'll wait to see what Apple (or anyone else) comes out with but I don't hold out much hope for any of them - seems like a lost cause. The marginal increase in convenience from having it on your wrist compared to taking it out of your pocket just doesn't counter the decrease in display size and functionality compared to a phone. Even if it was extremely low cost, if I have the phone with me anyway, why bother with the watch?
China's language problem will get fixed in 100 ms. =)
Technically it will be Algeria's language problems that get fixed in 100 ms. Unless Apple iWatch is allowed to use Google maps.
Pebble http://getpebble.com/
It doesn't have to be "incredibly smart". It just has to be smart in the right places.
The original iPhone didn't really do anything that wasn't available elsewhere already. But it bundled the proper things together in the proper way and had the proper design to make it all work well. I had owned several PDAs before, but the iPhone was the PDA I had always wanted.
Same for the watch. My bet is that while everyone else is working on cramming as much crap into the watch as possible. Apple is busy making sure there is no crap on it, only the right mix of the right stuff you really want on your wrist.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The trouble everyone is grappling with here is that they want a smart watch to be some kind of smartphone-like thing. We've seen it work in comics, right? Dick Tracey and all. The only trouble is that the size of things people want to put on their wrists isn't big enough for much of a display, isn't big enough for much of a data entry device and isn't big enough for much of a battery. You just can't pack a lot of function on there, much less do it attractively, much less do it in a form factor where it becomes a fashion accessory, particularly for ladies since ladies are used to tiny watches.
I have a collection of watches in a box for about the last ten years and have no plans of ever using them again. There's a large readable time display on my cell. there's time displays in many places such as in cars, on buildings, microwaves, TVs, computers.and more. As a last resort just ask someone "what time is it ?" I haven't noticed many people wearing watches lately. Why burn time and energy on this stupid shit, does any one really care ?
I'm not so quick in discounting them, even though the effect of Steve's passing has been quite obvious.
But Apple never was a one-man show, even though he took the spotlight. From all I know, Steve's strength was not in designing or creating anything, but in inspiring others and, most importantly, his ability to cut through the crap to the core issues and to kill anything that sucked. Where other companies spend time and resources on bad products (and sometimes even bring them to market), Steve would just kill it brutally with a few words and everyone could go back to making something good.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Leave the wrist alone -- Let's focus on a different body part. How about a Smart-Truss? Who wouldn't want a 1.5 Ghz processor warming their junk? Cupertino, I expect a slice of the action for this idea....
Development is programmable; Discovery is not programmable. (Fuller)
And who is killing the bad ideas now?
Seemingly everyone thinks they are, but has anyone seen any concrete proof besides some random patents?
It would be handy if it told the time as well
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
It's all about the interface. If you can interface well with the watch to accomplish the task - it should be a winner.
For the smartwatch to really take off it needs a flexible screen (samsung and lg both have these), that wraps around your wrist or unfurls to smallish smartphone, and most importantly has a data/voice connection of it's own (this way you can leave home on a jog or go to the pub and just take your watch). Problem is the big companies won't want to bring that out, because it could hurt the sales of their other products (safer to sell an accessory than a replacement).
Rocket Surgeon.
the last five hundred years of wrist-mounted technology is the result of a failure
Say what?? A smartass New Yorker wants to impress but fails to fact check
Wrist watches is a technology only about 100 years old
Before wristwatches became popular in the 1920s, most watches were pocket watches, which often had covers and were carried in a pocket and attached to a watch chain or watch fob.[3] In the early 1900s, the wristwatch, originally called a Wristlet, was reserved for women and considered more of a passing fad than a serious timepiece. Men, who carried pocket watches, were quoted as saying they would "sooner wear a skirt as wear a wristwatch"
Speakinf for myself, I'd rather wear a 16 core desktop than a smart watch; carrying the desktop, at least I'd have the advantage of the physical exercise, with a smart watch one can do mostly nothing: not enough computation power, screen economy, batery life.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Both samsung and lg have built flexible displays and you can expect them to start showing up in products next year (I'm pretty sure apple's iwatch will have one, if they are waiting till next year). With a flexible display you can get can get a smallish phone to be be a biggish watch. And before you go telling me everything cant be flexible it doesn't need to be (just enough to wrap it around a wrist), stuff like batteries can be multiple units separated around the band, and you can easily have a rigid spot in the middle for a circuit board.
Rocket Surgeon.
According to wiki:
Patek Philippe created the first wristwatch in 1868 for Countess Koscowicz of Hungary.
Too bad Job wasn't still around. He could "reinvent" that wristwatch.
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"-B.Franklin
Even a screen that's roughly 4x4 cm covering a square roughly the width of a man's wrist is too small to really be useful. This has been tried before with the Palm OS. Another thing is, large watches are ugly, and people won't buy them for that reason either. Sure, geeks would lap them up in droves of a few thousand units. After that, crickets...
Here is one I think has real potential:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/omate/omate-truesmart-water-resistant-standalone-smartwa
It was mentioned here on /. not long ago:
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/08/26/0454236/omate-truesmart-watch-stands-alone-no-phone-required
They have already reached some amazing stretch goals, such as Sapphire Crystal Glass, and are
aiming for further ones, like 720p video recording.
I've been working on wearable computers since 1994 (http://www.media.mit.edu/wearables/lizzy/oranchak/witintro.html) and I believe strongly in the concept. The smart phone has delivered nearly all the promise we had hoped for except hands-free operation. The cell phone watch is not new. I bought one that was made in China and wore it for years. In fact, I showed that watch at the Gadget Show during the 2008 International Symposium of Wearable Computers in Pittsburgh and I had been using for a couple of years at that point.
The watch doesn't offer a purely hands free experience, true, but I never lost that phone; I still have it. Answering calls is possible with the watch alone but a bluetooth headset is much more preferable. Nobody knew it was a phone until I received a call. That was generally followed by shock and amazement. I used it to track my billing hours. It was always there. It was pretty great, really.
The adoption of wearables has always been hampered by fashion strangeness. The watch format does a nice job of dealing with that. The screen size is challenging. Mine had a tiny little stylus and using it was merely possible and not much more. But, I could have a meeting with clients and nobody ever questioned it. When I wore my first wearable to its public opening, somebody on the subway asked if it was a bomb. The early wearables made the wearer self conscious in public; you had to be prepared to be stared at.
One of the early concepts proposed by Motorola was a constellation of devices that, together in synergy, becomes a full on wearable computer. That, I believe, was the project that first floated the idea of an ear bud headset. They, too, seemed strange at first but they have become widely adopted. That's where we are heading.
So, now, the electronics have gotten smaller, power consumption reduced to the point where battery bulk is reasonable, and infrastructure is in place to support wearable computers. Wearables are becoming real. Yet, there are still challenges. We hoped that head mounted displays would be key but we are still struggling with them. That's a field that I have been working on for the last decade. I know the challenges intimately and we are not there yet. In the meantime, the watch format is a viable intermediate step.
As for Apple coming to save the day: Frankly, I don't understand why people are so enamored with their offerings. They don't do anything different in my opinion. I prefer the Android approach that "opens the innovation tent" to everyone willing to give it a shot.
Wrist watches is a technology only about 100 years old
Patek Philippe created the first wristwatch in 1868 for Countess Koscowicz of Hungary., so 145 years.
That said, the smartass reporter did some research; Wearable watches date back about 500 years, but they appear to have been worn as necklaces (Flavor-Flav in the 16th century yo) rather than on the wrist. He just confused wearable with wrist-mounted.
Little Steve on your wrist will tell you that you are holding it wrong. Holding what? Well, what do you think you might be holding in the hand that shares a wrist with your watch? Yep, when Steve tells you it is too small you can say "that's what she said".
It'll run like the Performa 6116.
Frankly, I don't understand why people are so enamored with their offerings.
Because they are well made, easy to use, have a well thought out interface and for the most part require very little fiddling to work. My 94 year old technologically illiterate grandmother is able to effectively utilize an iPad while at the same time I am able to get what I want out of an iPhone and I'm about big a tech geek as you are likely to run into. What makes Apple products attractive and different is the software.
They don't do anything different in my opinion.
Ahh but they do and those differences are what people are willing to pay for. What you have to understand is that Apple is fundamentally a software company. Steve Jobs himself has said so explicitly. What is different about Apple's products is the software and what it does. It's not so much about them doing tasks that no one else can do as it is how they do those tasks. Apple (usually) provides a well designed and well executed experience and software is how they tie it all together. People buy Macs for the software - the hardware is barely different from PCs from Dell or HP. People buy iPods, iPhones and iPads for the software. The hardware isn't much different from the competition and in fact some competitors have rather slavishly copies Apple's designs. What Apple does differently is found in their software.
I prefer the Android approach that "opens the innovation tent" to everyone willing to give it a shot.
Nothing wrong with that but there are positives as well as drawbacks. If you are someone (like me and probably you) who really likes to fiddle with your gear then Android might very well be a better choice. But for my non-tech savvy relatives who just want a smartphone I point them at an iPhone. Not everyone wants to endlessly mess around with arcane features of their phones. Apple's products aren't for everyone but Apple has never pretended that they were. That said they sell an awful lot of product so they clearly are doing something that appeals to a lot of people.
That's not a concern if they can also hurt the sales of their competitors' products.
Do you care about the security of your wireless mouse?
Oh please give us a break. As if only Apple can figure anything out. I find it humorous how much they copied from Android into iOS the last few rounds.
There's the one thing that companies like Samsung can't find out without copying Apple (as demonstrated by that horror watch that Samsung released): What features to add and more importantly, what features to leave out.
Or he can buy one of those AMD quad laptops and be able to do a million more things a bazillion times better than a so called "smart watch".
I do find it ironic how the tech corps are pushing "smart watches are the wave of the future!" when more and more people are treating watches like 8-tracks and not wearing a watch, preferring to check their smartphone. Hell even my elderly parents have quit wearing watches, they find the big screen of their Android phones easier to read and includes the weather. Folks are always messing with their phones anyway so why not?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I look forward to the specialization of wearables. So far, most wearable computers interact with the users mobile device and only do a little bit of onboard computing. Why not create a mobile device which specializes in providing the computing for wearables? I imagine that it would be well protected with a big battery. Instead of a touchscreen, I'd give it e-ink like the kindle. Ideally, this device should only have to be charged once a day, and backlights and touchscreens are a pretty big power drain. I might even try to use the AR device and the Watch synchronously to create a typing system, for quick tweets and texts. We have pretty good predictive typing, why not make use of it? Word or letter suggestions could be arrayed around the watch at the stations of the clock, and twisting the hand the watch is on to scroll through suggestions.
This one does look kind of cool, especially like the whole 'it is a phone' thing. I already do most of my stuff on the Nexus 7 anyways, so tethering between the two and still having a device to take phone calls on would actually be pretty great.
Thirty four characters live here.
Even as a tech-savvy early adopter I don't find the idea of a smartwatch particularly appealing. I only ever wore a watch for utilitarian reasons and I gladly dropped the practise after I started carrying a more capable device (a phone) I find the pocketable slab-of-glass form factor to be ideal for my mobile computing needs and as much as I try to imagine a watch being a useful addition to it in some way, I just don't see it. Poking at a tiny screen or talking to my wrist do not appeal to me at all so anything input-related is out. I guess notifications could be handy but I'm not going to spend money, strap something to my body, and deal with keeping it charged just for that. A vibe in my pocket and a quick peek at my phone if I really care is fine for me. I guess if I was always walking or doing something where even pulling out my phone is a pain I might see things differently, but that's not me.
built in? I am wondering if what is really needed here is not a watch sized display that talks to the phone in your bag, but a phone mounted on your wrist. The only problem with that scenario now is that shirt sleeves aren't made to accommodate a phone-sized object strapped to your wrist. So what we really need then is for shirts to be made with bigger sleeves and some sort of strap attachment for a phone to put it on your wrist (OK, maybe a minor tweak to the phone design so that the power button is located where you can get at it more easily while the phone is strapped to your wrist).
The great breakthrough is going to come from a clothing designer, NOT a phone maker.
One more thing- that strap should hold the phone along the radius- the bone on the thumb side of your wrist (like a pipboy 3000) - where it is easy to access without turning your wrist into an uncomfortable position, as many so-called smart watches require.
There is one thing that Apple could do that a conventional electronic devices or software house competitor cannot: shift the discussion from wearable tech to pieces of fashionable clothing. If we think about it, the white earbuds are a fashion item as much as an accessory for MP3 players. People made or adapted existing bracelets to wear the iPod Nano as a wristwatch. Loads of armbands were built to accommodate wearing iPods and iPhones when exercising. Nike has sensors for shoes that link up with the current generation of iPod. The tech part they've got nailed already (Sony, Samsung, Apple, Google, ... all of them). Getting people to wear it without looking silly is the challenge and has been for a long time.
What Apple can do rather than try to out-gadget the gadget makers is to design beautiful items of clothing that have the right pockets in the right places to carry the iPhone. Maybe some way to get a microphone and headphones built in to make calls and chat with Siri. There's always money for fashion items and I suspecct that Apple fanboy/girl would be happy to wear the team's colours. Pay £150 for a turtleneck? No problem. They can all wear the same model of iClothes until next year's is released. It would be a bit like Star Trek, with everyone on the planet wearing the same type of clothes.
aiming for further ones, like 720p video recording.
That's what I mean.
Why in all hells would I want a watch that does video recording? Or Facebook? Or messaging?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
A smart watch once saved Harold Crick's life.
"400 Million Chinese can't speak Mandarin"
What about us 6 billion 600 million Non- Chinese who can't speak Mandarin?
I want to get fixed too.
I think that what a smartwatch needs to be is as a "companion device" to a phone, and nothing more.
It needs a screen, two buttons (or areas to tap) for "Yes" and "No" and low-bandwidth communication with the phone. The phone tells the watch what to display and what the buttons mean. The watch then needs only to reply with "Message understood, displaying screen", "Yes" and "No". That's it.
All the "killer apps" that a smartwatch could be used for require those things and nothing more.
The Samsung watch and many stand-alone smartwatches are too powerful, too feature-rich and already too bloated. The Samsung watch is already too large to wear comfortably on the wrist. Has anyone mentioned battery life yet? My Casio has a battery life measured in years.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
The nano doesn't have iOS functionality or at least it doesn't provide the iOS api for new apps. IMNHO he nano screen needs to be about twice as wide to be useful in any "more than nerd toy" way.
Omate true smart on Kickstarter looks like a good option. it seems to do everything a Smart Watch should do.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
What about the 900 million who can speak mandarin?
Language - Percent of World Population
Mandarin 12.44%
Spanish 4.85%
English 4.83%
Arabic 3.25%
Hindi 2.68%
Bengali 2.66%
Portuguese 2.62%
Russian 2.12%
Japanese 1.80%
German 1.33%
Javanese 1.25%
Others 61.17%
And who is killing the bad ideas now?
The consumer, just like they do for other consumer electronics items and computers.
Right, and the problem with that is that it's a lot slower than having someone at the company do it early. Most stuff they send to market will be crap like it is from the other vendors.
I wouldn't be surprised if the managers at Apple are all so busy watching each other and playing court politics that innovation is dead. Jobs was very vocal and out there about what was good and bad for his company and what he liked and didnt like. I hear the new guy has nothing to say unless hes pissed. Good luck Apple..
Have you fscked your local propeller head today?
i had 3 years of others in high school. i never really did learn the verbs.
Ive has been there about 2 decades and has seen what it takes mentally to kill off losers & I see him having the strength to do it.
I agree with other Slashdot comments that a smart watch needs to be able to work with an iPhone, so you don't have to pick up the phone all the time.
Unique features might allow NFC to work exchanging contact info and "approvals", instead of cards and cash.
In no particular order:
Of course, provides time, calendar, stopwatch, snooze alarm, etc. the usual watch functionality
Other options could be added, but at that point, I think it would be business specific
for example; scan items and barcodes. Etc..
Runner's watches have been around for awhile now. I realize this is slashdot and that may not be an area of expertise for you. If you can combine what a runner's watch does for fitness with some of the some of the quick needs that would stop the need for pulling out my phone to look.. notifications, see who's calling, weather, time... I think it could be win!
Why in all hells would I want a watch that does video recording? Or Facebook? Or messaging?
Samsung doesn't know the answer to that. But I seriously doubt they even asked themselves the question.
The Apple iWatch will have a 3D avatar of Steve Jobs on its screen at all times. This will make the iWatch "Insanely Smart".
The innovation will be that it's actually called "myWatch" and Apple will extract royalties directly from your account on the use of the name every time it records you saying "let me check my watch". Apple stocks will soar!
Later software updates (that you have to agree with so that you can continue to use your music collection that you don't own) will extract royalties every time you think it.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Yep, these watches are going no where fast. They need to be cheap, and last for days.
Good-bye
How is the current or future generation of iWatches going to be any different than an iPhone/Android phone in a small form factor strapped to your wrist? You'll still need a bluetooth headset to talk/hear the conversation.
It seems that the iWatch companies are trying to save us 1second of having to dig our phone out of our pocket. They don't look all that attractive compared to a similarly priced watch (mechanical or quartz) and remind me of the calculator watches of the 80s.
Right now I'd love a watch as small and light as my simple casio but which vibrates when I have a call. I am tired of my phone ringing when I don't want to it too and when it does ring I miss the call. The Pebble is about everything I want in a smartwatch, though it could be thinner and lighter. Unfortunately unless Pebble gets bought by Google or Google releases a GoogleNow API its not going to work. The next GoogleGlass product could very well be their headset in watch form. If it just provided notifications and a limited ability to screen texts and calls, it would be awesome, but it HAS to be light and unobtrusive. It should not look like a "SmartWatch!(TM)".
Smartphones didn't happen big because of the iPhone, the singular tech which made them work was the capacitive multitouch screen. Only this allowed the device to have enough screen and still work well enough. The first iPhone didn't have GPS, apps, navigation, etc. and it was still a big success because of that screen.
Smartwatches will need some similar tech breakthroughs before they work. Here's what they need:
*They will need to be very light, very low-power, and physically flexible.
*They will need to come in a variety of form factors to suit different tastes (watches are fashion accessories, not gadgets).
*It should know who I am via some kind of biometrics.
*It would be totally fine if its tied to a smartphone but it will need to have some functionality on its own (I can't even tell if this Samsung watch can tell time without help.
*Battery life should be around a week.
*It should have Google Now like functionality, giving me information without me having to ask.
*It should serve as my cyber-implant on the outside. It should be the conduit through which I communicate with other machines. It should not only authenticate me, but allow me to interact with other machines via gestures.
What it doesnt need:
*an illuminated screen (at least not all the time). Flexible eInk/ePaper with a backlight would be more than enough.
*a camera
*a microphone
*the ability to make calls on its own
I already bought a developers edition with more ram. It's not perfect but I'm not holding my breath on the big guys doing it properly any time soon, plus it's quite a good price for a phone (i won't feel bad turning it into a 3g drone platform if my dream phone comes along in a year).
Rocket Surgeon.
I could see a slight advantage to having a wrist band that changed color according to the urgency of the call/email/message, but that requires AI to function properly. Having moved away from wearing a blackberry on my belt, towards hiding my smartphone in a pocket, the smart-wrist thing is useful only to free up some of the time spent to pull your phone out to read it (yes, I drink lattes and am burdened by first world problems), only the cheaper models would fit within a profile of "don't want this taken from me on the subway".
In NSA America social networks join you!
Well, go see your local doctor. A little snip, and poof, you are fixed.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Projection much?
ProTip: Not being a fanboi of the thing you're a fanboi of does not mean being a fanboi of some other thing. There is also the possibility that you've outgrown the need to be a fanboi at all.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
From all I know, Steve's strength was not in designing or creating anything, but in inspiring others and, most importantly, his ability to cut through the crap to the core issues and to kill anything that sucked.
Well, Tim Cook doesn't seem to be doing well in any of those areas, so, what's left but to milk the legacy of Jobs?
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Javanese is the overly excited language programmers speak at around 10am after 4 cups of coffee right?
"Even Apple"? Apple has never been cutting edge in terms of technology. They're good at physical design and interfaces but they have never really done anything groundbreaking. While you can argue this is an interface issue, while Apple is good at improving them they aren't really good at coming up with innovative new ones.
Nothing is funnier than a Techno Hipster making fun of somebody wearing a wrist watch while he unpacks his phablet to check the time.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
Funny.. I just copy/pasted the table from wikipedia and it has the mistake..... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_native_speakers
I'd be happy with a Pip-Boy equivalent. Then I could ditch the phone taking up room in my pocket, too.
brwski
"Because without beer, things do not seem to go as well''
No spoilers. I regard "Memory Blank" (John Stith) with the same sort of affection as "Chronicles of Amber". Late posting, I know, but it's a good read, but you'll probably have to find it in the second hand shop.
I still think this might just be misdirection on Apple's part.
I've racked my brain trying to dream up a smartwatch I'd want, couldn't really hack it.
Maybe Apple will come up with something nice.Or maybe they'll come up with something shiny, magical and overpriced
You lacked imagination.
A watch that links with my phone via bluetooth, which will act as mic+speaker, with headphone plugs, and shows the time and alerts (phone call showing caller, text, reminders, etc) with vibrate option, 2 side buttons to let me take or reject calls, would have removed my need to take the phone out 95% of the time.
Headphone wires going from my wrist, through my sleeve, to my ear is much less troublesome than from my pocket or bag. Bluetooth headsets are ok, but I don't want to risk dropping/misplacing one simply because I took it off for a minute.
Bonus for a tiny camera for doing facetime calls or taking pictures.
Oliver.
Mistake? Java is an island of Indonesia, with over a hundred million people (also making it the world's most populous island and one of the most densely-populated places in the world).
It's not just a programming language and a cup of coffee. :)
Doesn't that need revising now that the Chinese government has admitted that 400 million of them cannot speak it after all? Based on the figures for English, that seems to be counting only first language speakers, so Mandarin should be lower still (Chinese government may call all of China outside of a couple of special administrative regions native speakers, but the reality is very different, and many more will speak it as a second language in addition to the 400 million who cannot speak it).
If you look at Apple's product line, their smart watch would probably fit in mainly as an iOS/OS X remote, letting you connect to all of your iTunes-account-connected devices. Apple TV remote (with accelerometer), autologin/unlock within range, notifications from all of your devices aggregated(?), GPS, maybe some way to access Spotlight on all devices and Siri to tie everything together. Apps would mainly use notifications to work with the device. Home automation and security systems could be interesting.
Apple dont create/invent anything.
They just market well and have legions of fanboys/girls.
If your company relies on the CEO to be the final QA, you have a bigger problem.
Other companies would kill for having the problems that Apple had during the past decade. So your point is?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
We glance at a normal watch to see how much time is left, or how late we are. We don't much need to know 'timenow' in numbers. Anything 'digital' has the wrong metaphor.
That's simply wrong and everybody knows it, no matter what Jobs might have said once in one of his promotional videos.
"Wrong"? No. Counterintuitive I'll agree. Apple sells a vertically integrated product but (almost) no one buys a Mac to run Windows or Linux on it. They buy it because of OS X. OS X is what makes a Mac a Mac. Without OS X a Mac is just another me-too PC.
Oh and just because you dislike Steve Jobs doesn't mean he is wrong. I've listened to a lot of his talks over the years and I've seen few instances where he was wrong about the big picture business model stuff. He got the details wrong sometimes but I'm pretty sure he understood perfectly what made Apple profitable and what did not.
Apple's profit still mostly comes from hardware sales and it has always been that way.
Apple's profit is almost entirely in their software. Their revenue comes from selling that software on Apple hardware. Huge difference. Apple hardware is essentially a commodity and would not command much if any profit without Apple's software. The functional parts of a Mac are almost identical to a randomly chosen PC. iPhones internals are close to identical to those of any other similarly spec'ed smartphone. Same with iPods and same with iPads. The ONLY functional piece of the device that is meaningfully different is the software.
If they were a software company, they could easily open OS X and iOS to other hardware manufacturers, but in fact that would be their immediate death sentence.
You just made my argument for me. If Apple were not a software company then it would not matter if they opened up their operating systems. After all, if the software is not the critical piece of Apple's business model then there would be no harm in trying to spread the software to third parties. You can tell what the core business of a company is by examining what would happen if you gave that piece of the business away. Apple doesn't even manufacture their own hardware for the most part. The design it and have someone else build it. But they do manufacture their own software and they don't outsource that to anyone.
On an offtopic note:
When Abe Simpson says he "tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time," it's taken as insane old-man ramblings, but it's actually a very obscure reference to the old school watches... called "onions" or "turnips."
See the last sentence here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_watches#1800.E2.80.931850_Lever_escapement
The inability to easily play content outside of itunes or the short list of Apple approved apps kept it from ever really taking off.
While Apple is good at overcoming fragmentation in a given area of technology, bringing together the right functions in to one easy to use device. I believe their inability to play well with third party developers or to leave code open so others can develop technology that works with it, would keep a smart watch from becoming the new piece of technology it needs to be.
Apples product design seems to be the exact same device in multiple form factors. People do not need to wear a second phone on their wrists, instead I believe for it to really take off it will need to be a new device in itself that works in conjunction with your phone. Bringing alerts and easy responses to your wrist for convenience, as well as new features that have not taken off well on phones: NFC, wireless payments, location specific services. I would love if a friend could take a group picture and then tap their phone to my watch to send the pic to my phone, (similar tech to S-beam) but this requires standard communication across multiple devices, something Apple is absolutely terrible at.
Population of China (CIA world factbook) 1,349,585,838 (July 2013 est.)
If you subtract 400MM you get roughly 900MM. Since the "official" language is Mandarin even if you speak something else at home I suspect you would count as a mandarin speaker if you know it as well. Case in point my wife's cousin is from fuzhou. He speaks some dialect my wife cant understand (Fuzhou dialect I believe), as well as Mandarin. Would he be a mandarin speaker in China's eyes? Probably.
Actually I'd call it more retro than techno. After all my grandfather would reach into his pocket to check the time on his pocketwatch, and now we reach into our pocket and get the time, temp, reminders, and so much more. Plate it with brass and it'd be almost steampunk.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I'm a 60 year old techno super/hyper hipster. I stopped wearing a wristwatch in the mid-90s when they just started falling off, and I mean one after another after another till I got tired of it. Then I went for 5 or 6 years without any watch at all before I bought a $3.00 Chinese army pocket watch. It was awesome, until it took a dunk. Oh well. I learned then that really if you just pay attention to the "feeling " of the passage of time and the shadows and light you really don't need a watch. I can usually (if I'm not totally wiped out tired) tell you the time to within ten minutes at any time of day or night. I can also wake up at any time of day or night from a deep sleep.
Subversion of spatial scale luxury decoration ideas.