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Leak: Almost a Third of Samsung Galaxy Gear Smartwatches Are Being Returned
llebeel writes "Almost a third of Samsung's Galaxy Gear Smartwatches sold are being returned, a leaked document has revealed, which shows that over 30 percent are being returned after sale at Best Buy locations in the US. The higher than expected return rate could be due to that realisation, with customers impulse buying and then realising that the smartwatch isn't everything it's cracked up to be." I'd like to hear from more people with smart watches who are happy with them, to better understand the appeal.
One out of three people decided they looked like a dork with that awful thing on their wrist.
"Would you, could you, with a goat?" Dr Seuss
I sometimes thought the iWatch rumor was just a plant by Apple to get everyone else in the industry to trip over themselves trying to get the watch out before Apple.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
I can say I am happy with my smart watch. Now that I made my post to slashdot, please excuse me but I have to run to Best Buy to return it.
Or maybe most of them are just treating Best Buy as "try it out before I order it from Amazon."
...which interacts only with your smartphone, requiring you to always the smartphone with you. This whole idea is so fundamentally flawed, and almost unfathomably stupid - as stupid as buying a mini remote control for your main remote control. Why on earth would anyone bother with a "smart" watch if they can just as easily use the phone with a much better experience?
Not sure why this is news. Most folks already carry a smartphone & don't need their watch to do some of those functions.
I guess the people who bought it realized that having a watch you have to charge every night isn't all that useful.
(Contrast with a regular watch which, at the very worst, you replace the battery twice a year. Or other smart watches that you can go a week between charging them.)
The last time I wore a watch was in high school before I started playing volleyball. After I started, there was no point to a watch. There's basically no point of wearing a watch today. It's only useful for people that want to show how expensive their Rolex is.
...reaching in your pocket to get your phone.
It's sad in that same way as the family member who's sitting by the TV but searching desperately for the remote.
If they did, that would be the most masterful bit of trolling ever. Look at us! We got Samsung and others the blow ridiculous sums of cash for a stupid product that no one will ever buy!
Now we just need someone to photoshop a troll-apple logo. :)
I sometimes thought the iWatch rumor was just a plant by Apple to get everyone else in the industry to trip over themselves trying to get the watch out before Apple.
I see enough iTools wearing their iPod Nano on their wrist like its a watch, and it has no connectivity at all. Apparently the appeal of something on your wrist is that it doesn't do much. That's where Samsung went wrong.
I knew since they launched it that it'd be too small to read, too big, too heavy, too warm, too annoying to charge, and too underperforming. I have a feeling so did Samsung. Obviously the average consumer knows nothing about mobile technology or they'd have known it too. At least they finally figured it out days after buying it. What a bunch of idiots. I wouldn't be surprised if some returned it because their magic magnetic energy field anti-cancer aura-boosting magnet wristband was interfering with it.
They're just rolling out the update now. Unless someone owns a Note 3 the Gear is basically worthless. I bet a good % of the returns are people who didn't realize it wasn't compatible with their phone.
I had a Sony Live View.
It couldn't even tell time without syncing to my phone. I had to open my phone, sync the watch, then see the time. In that time I went past 3 clocks on my phone.
Wouldn't be the first time they used rumours to their own advantage. It's widely accepted that Apple seeded rumours of an "under-$1000" price point for the original iPad to make its actual $500 price look really, really good. I doubt it's a coincidence that HP and Microsoft's own tablet, the Slate 500, wound up costing $800 later that year. They surely hoped to undercut Apple's rumoured target price when they were doing the original design work.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
I think people want them, but Samsung tried to get the jump on Apple by pushing a half-baked product. I don't think Apple will nail it either because what people want in a smart watch is out of reach of current technology - the components are just too big. People want a smart watch which is indiscreet. It looks like a regular watch in both design, function and form factor yet magically can interface with your phone in a way which is neither cumbersome or frustrating. I think right now, people would be happy with a watch which simply vibrates when the phone in their pocket or backpack gets a text or phone call. Maybe scrolls an indiscreet caller id on the screen, or marquee of the text. Perhaps does a voice reply to a text message. That would be enough for now instead of trying to fit a phone on your wrist.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Now that Samsung has failed so miserably, Apple knows what worked and what didn't, and can better bring their design to market when it is ready.
IMHO Samsung failed to include the front-facing camera and the ability to play video. This is supposed to be a Dick Tracy watch dammit!
Magic doesn't work in my presence. My power of disbelief is too strong.
Responding to your subject line, I want a smart watch. I want one that's done right, which means the right functionality, integrated in the right way with my other personal electronics.
I ultimately want to have Google Glass (or similar), a smart watch and a smart phone with a large screen (6" is about right). I think the three devices could work very well together.
The phone, of course, is the brain, the connectivity, and the user interface for "heavy" work. Anything involving data entry or interacting with large amounts of data. Glass is an audio/video output device, to provide no-hands, no-interference content when I need it. Heads-up navigation, audio playback, video messages, etc. But it's not something I'd want to wear all of the time, both because I don't think the battery will stand up to constantly being on and because it's awkward in some social situations. A smartwatch is an ideal form factor for lightweight I/O. It can provide unobtrusive notifications and quick, easy access to small but important pieces of information. It can also be an input device for controlling Glass, one that's a lot more convenient than the frame-mounted touchpad (in fact, I hope a future version of Glass does away with the frame-mounted touchpad using smartwatch integration instead) and provides a lot more control than head gestures.
Galaxy Gear isn't yet the smartwatch that I want, though.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I wonder how good the design process was really...
If I'm going to have a watch-type device whose purpose is to interface with my phone, I want it to do the following WELL:
Dial calls.
Show caller ID and answer calls.
Show navigation/map data.
Control audio playback.
Control method of output for phonecalls (switch between bluetooth headset, watch speakerphone, and phone speakerphone, and conventional phone).
Compass and orienteering (direction and distance).
Quick-launching, mid-resolution camera pointed out the side (2048x1536 at most for still images).
Clock.
Make it do these things well, make it cheap, and make it thin enough to not look ridiculous, and you may have something. It doesn't have to do everything, it doesn't need a notepad or high-resolution camera or Angry Birds, it just needs to do a few simple things that will allow one to leave one's phone in one's pocket or backpack or purse for the basics of communication, and give just a few more useful features.
When the Palm Pilot was designed, the designer carried around a block of wood and figured out when it would have been nice for that block of wood to do something. Hence the calendar, the notepad, the contacts list, the tasks list, and the like. This approach should work well for something watch-sized too.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Smart watch but dumb marketing. This idea came to market about twenty years too late. Perhaps if it arrived before the market was flooded with smart phones, it might have enjoyed a short life, maybe one on my wist before being added to the junk box collection of smart-looking but quite dumb wrist-watches. Now where did I put that sun-dial ?
20 years too late? Similar gadgets have been introduced and failed long before that. Seiko wrist TV is but one.
Time Bomber the Book coming soon.
I have been very satisfied with the watch. It really depends on what you need a wrist mounted device for. For me the notifications of messages and email during numerous meetings, allows me to only pull out my phone for things that I need to respond to immediately. When I am in the factory I used to frequently miss things due to the noise and movement. Now I never miss anything because I always feel my wrist vibrate. Battery life has been satisfactory. I have never went below 50% in a 18 hour day of use and frequently have 65% left. I charge my phone and laptop every day, so it’s not a problem for me plugging in another device. I also use the watch as a speaker phone in my car with great success.
If you are looking to run apps on the watch rather than the phone then you are going to be disappointed.
From TFA: the watch only works with tablets. It didn't work with Samsung cell phones except since this morning or something like that.
I detest ringtones in the office, so my phone is always set to silent. My Pebble allows me to see my wife calling/texting me. This alone justifies the price. The Gear is overpriced for what it offers, and requires their phone to work. My Pebble works with android and iOS. (disclaimer, I only use mine with android) I can set the watch face to whatever I like, including the very useful Beer O'Clock face that a friend made.
I prefer to check the time with a watch. Till I got my Pebble, I usually wore one of several Invicta chronographs that I own. I don't like digging a phone out of my pocket to verify the time, especially when in meetings. A quick glance is sufficient to tell when I am going to be late getting home, without the rudeness of pulling my phone out and conspicuously checking time.
it is better to light a flame thrower than curse the darkness. -Terry Pratchett Men at Arms
Why have you set your phone to give you immediate notifications about things you don't need to respond to immediately?
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
A lot of people don't even like wearing watches, I can't imagine people going for full-on bracers.
Either things are going to stay pocketable or some sort of augmented reality solution are the things I could believe. If I were a betting man, I would bet that pocketable will continue to rule the day.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
I have had my Gear (and Galaxy Note 3) for most of the month now. As a business user (I own an IT consulting firm) I find the Gear supremely useful. I don't agree with most of the bad reviews I have read. To dispel some myths: I can go for a few days on a battery charge. I do sleep eventually so slipping it on the charger overnight is no biggie. I am an Exchange user and I get notified of incoming e-mail (and can read a summary) and can see my appointments for the day. Actually taking a call via hands free on the watch works well too, which I was surprised by. I didn't expect that part to be of particular value but I find myself taking calls like that and wearing my Bluetooth earpiece less. This stuff alone is worth the price for me. I think people are expecting this to be some whiz-bang toy and blow sunshine up their butts. This is a productivity tool and delivers it's value in that manner.
Officially a geek since 1984
I've had my Pebble for about 3 months and am very happy with it. I like wearing a watch and this device provides a simple remote notification display and limited-feature remote control for my Android phone. It's waterproof, lasts a week on a charge, and was inexpensive enough that I won't be heartbroken if it gets lost or damaged.
What possible excuse could a person have to return a $300 watch which needs recharging every single day, doesn't tell you the time unless you light up the display (and you can't see any way in strong sunlight) and offers functionality which people don't need and doesn't work properly even if they did?
So far, kind of useless. But is only $35.00 Dlls but who would bother to return it?
There is no pandora app for my TV or for any of my other set top boxes, so I just use my Chromecast to stream Pandora into the living room while I do other things. But I got it only because of the 3 months of Netflix (which I did get). I would have never bought it otherwise. It has very limited uses.
That word - indiscreet. It doesn't mean what you think it means.
And you only need to recharge it about once a week.....not 3 times a day.
Solving Unix problems since 1989...
Sounds a lot like pebble.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
No, it just doesnt enough. People expect the thing to replicate all smartphone functionality, when in fact it only works with the Samsung browser, WhatsApp, S-Calendar, and the default (not gMail) email app.
A bit like the Samsung S-View cover feature. Its nice, but why doesn't it tell me more about individual app notifications? (the same way i do see a face when called)
Hivemind harvest in progress..
I love my Chromecast.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Not just Samsung phones, but only a couple new models of Samsung phone. An iWatch will probably be compatible with at least the 4S, meaning most iPhone users will be able to use it.
The MotoX already has this feature available. "Trusted Devices" http://www.androidcentral.com/trusted-bluetooth-devices-must-have-every-smartphone-going-forward ... but you have to have a bluetooth device on your wrist, preferably a BT 4.0 (low energy) device, like the Pebble Smartwatch.
Very few younger people wear watches these days, because mobile phones serve as a reasonable replacement. As a result, the sudden interest in wearable tech seems slightly odd. It's almost as if Apple's R&D team prototyped a watch just to see what it would be like, and someone leaked the news in a frantic frenzy, ignoring the fact that it is - by and large - a dumb idea that Apple might very easily shelve (along with the silly notion of an Apple-branded TV set).
Maybe they always were. Functional, but they're jewlery. I have a nice Citizen Ecodrive I'm fond of. It's functional, it's lightweight, it never needs batteries, and it looks nice. It's titanium, with a sapphire face.
It allows me to casually check time in meetings without being rude; it looks professional; that's important for what I do, less important for others.
Smartwatches are horrible to look at. They are gaudy and tacky. I am not sure what they say about the wearer, but I am not sure they are part of the image I would want to project. Yes, that type of thing matters to some people. Particularly, I suspect, those who still wear watches.
What I want is a nice watch like that that maybe has a silent notification capabilty, and perhaps, can pick up some biometric data (pulse, whatever). I would find real value in that - something that my phone can't do, an an alert to get me to check my phone for something interesting or pressing.
I can see myself getting Google Glasses before a smartwatch.
Get off my lawn.
..don't panic
but only if it replaces my smartphone.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
http://www.metawatch.com/
And honestly I love it.
I basically got it because I would often miss texts and calls coming from my iPhone because I tend to leave it on vibrate. I sometimes don't feel it going off in my pocket and if it is in my coat or bag I won't get the message until way to late. I see posts out there that tend to be pretty contemptuous along the lines of "Oh poor hipster, it's just too damned difficult to get your phone out...", and honestly yes...yes it is if you don't carry the phone in your friggin' pocket. The key here is the simplicity of the display. The watch itself is a little clunky and complex and the button arrangement takes some getting use to. The display however is pretty clean and simple, and the watch does not try to do any aside from be another way to get basic info to your eyeballs.
Which is probably one reason why we haven't seen it yet. With few notable exceptions, and almost none in the last decade, Apple doesn't release half-baked products. Certainly not on the hardware side.
I don't think that it is out of reach of current technology, I'm sure that you could get a nice feature set into a slim watch form factor. Look at what was done with the iPod Nano. It had storage, a modest microcontroller, a color touchscreen, and an audio codec. About the only thing missing from it is some form of radio communications - bluetooth 4 being the most likely candidate - and modestly greater battery capacity to support that.
If they did, that would be the most masterful bit of trolling ever. Look at us! We got Samsung and others the blow ridiculous sums of cash for a stupid product that no one will ever buy!
Second-most masterful, after the so-called "Apple Television"
No. 20 years ago we had the Casio databank watch... A calculator, world time clock, and personal contact manager. It wasn't cool back then either, it made you a nerd.
I had a Casio calculator watch (just a boring calculator watch, without the databank stuff) when I was a kid, and I can assure you it didn't make me a nerd. In fact, the causality is exactly opposite; being a nerd made me get a calculator watch.
My dad (65yo) has a Pebble, and is pleased as punch with it. He uses it with an iPhone, but they supposedly work with Android, which would include all the (2) devices Samsung's Gear watch works with. So perhaps that's a better alternative for folks looking for a smartwatch.
And for those making the "look like a dork" cracks, he's a very succesfful lawyer and takes great care with his professional appearance. He did change the band out for a decortive one that looks much better in the circles he hangs out in. You can do that with a Pebble because it uses a standard watch band. The Gear?...nope.
Existing and previous Windows tablets at that time were priced above 1000$ so the rumors were plausible. iPad was never priced as premium product so it's hard to undercut. iPhone IS premium priced.
Haha that would explain a lot.
Smartwatches were around for a long time before the iWatch rumor and they'd always been niche devices for hardcore nerds.
I'd have one, but the big problem is that the screen is too small to make it a replacement for my phone. I already carry a phone. If the screen were big enough to be a phone replacement, I could just strap my phone to my wrist instead. I think it's safer in my pocket.
If you just want notifications from your phone...then just get a cheaper, normal-looking, longer-running bluetooth watch instead. They've been out for a long time too.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
If Glass were done right, with a Microvision-type retinal-projection display, it could replace the 6" screen. If they could double as sunglasses, so much the better.
Everything else is a matter of miniaturization and battery life. I would take an E:FC-style Global with a roll-out screen in the meantime, though.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
It doesn't help (for Samsung, at least) that whatever small 'smartwatch' market exists is largely being catered to by outfits who are more realistic about how much you can actually cram into something that fits on the wrist.
I have absolutely no interest in owning either; but the 'Pebble' outfit managed to get not-totally-ridiculous battery life, along with reasonable size; by being realistic about what they could do: low power transreflective display, limited firmware (with SDK; but not one connected with any broader ecosystem).
Samsung just goes and bolts the guts of a first/second gen-ish Android phone, minus the cell modem and wifi, to your wrist. Glowy color screen, CPU that's fast enough to gobble battery (but not fast enough to make Samsungified Android run smoothly), integrated perv cam that makes the strap impossible to swap, the thing's a bulbous mess to fit a battery large enough to last a day, and they managed to make it compatible with almost nothing(it is Android; but it's already on the edge of acceptable battery life, has anemic performance, and a small display, so it isn't meaningfully 'compatible' with the broader ecosystem, and its notification display features only work with a small number of applications). Brilliant work.
I'm not sold on 'smartwatch' as a concept; but even if we accept the goodness of the idea as a foundational assumption, Samsung fucked it up.
The other two thirds of the buyers will return them after the holidays.
Why not just sit down and use a laptop rather than trying to be Star Trek? You might actually get work done, and save a ton of money in the process.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
and i don't feel any need to defend it.
That's nice. Makes sense. Perfectly reasonable.
Now, turn into a committee.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I own a Pebble. The Pebble does many of the things on your list well (albeit a few of those functions are third-party apps). It lacks a camera, and with it's black-and-white transflective display doesn't have the resolution for map data. But the combination of the Pebble, the "Pebble Dialer" app, and a Bluetooth headset is the "killer app" for a smartwatch. The basic music app on the watch is "good enough", but Music Boss adds extra features that makes it indispensable. Throw in the whole way it handles notifications from other apps and it's a great augment to an Android cell phone.
The only universal socially acceptable watch is one with an analog dial.
Exactly. Preferably a mechanical one. Modern Swiss if you can afford it but there are a lot of very nice vintage mechanical Swiss watches available on eBay for the same kind of money as a modern quartz one. Back in the 70s when quartz first came in they were considered landfill, now they're appreciated for the little precision marvels they really are. There are an awful lot that were dumped (commercially speaking) in India that are now showing up. This for example. They aren't the same quality as your Rolexes or IWCs but that's because all that now remains of the industry is the very high end.
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs," I said. "we have a protractor"
bzzt, wrong. What you describe is perfectly feasible and has been for over a year. Even Sony's last-generation Smartwatch did what you describe while remaining compatible with 22mm watch bands (I believe the Pebble also works with standard 22mm watch bands).
"I think right now, people would be happy with a watch which simply vibrates when the phone in their pocket or backpack gets a text or phone call." - Sony Smartwatch plus WatchIt! - I've been doing this since last October. My watch vibrates and shows the notification for any notification my device receives (except for ones I've filtered out in the WatchIt! app.)
The problem with the Gear is they threw in a ton of unnecessary hardware that drove up bulk and price, while still managing to offer LESS than what the Pebble or last year's Sony SmartWatch do.
What's hilarious is that everyone is tripping over themselves to develop an "awesome" SmartWatch, and still the best SWs on the market are some of the oldest ones (except for Sony's new SW2, which is just a minor tech refresh of the original SW - higher resolution display and a more robust charger connection) which have the most basic hardware on the watch itself - because they're primarily designed as a "second display" for the phone.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Trololololol....
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Battery life is an important one - supposedly Apple's prototypes are getting 3-4 days, which is considered insufficient. One day is horrendous, and even the Galaxy Gear doesn't get that - going into deep battery preservation modes near the end as the battery runs down and it still doesn't quite make it. (One day - you forget to charge it and you're done for).
3-4 days Apple deems insufficient (they are aiming for an entire week), but at least you can forget to charge it overnight and it still works in the morning.
But then again, Apple's probably wondering what's the use. I mean, it makes sense for Samsung as ever-larger phones means they get put in places that are harder to access constantly so the watch is essential to avoid having to dig the phone out from the bottom of a purse or messenger bag just to see if you have new messages.
Or like how HTC has a "small phone accessory" to go along with the big phone so you don't have to dig out your big phone just to reply to a text.
The Samsung Billboard just south of San Francsisco on 101 shows just how useless this device is. It shows someone holding a phone in their hand but has it turned over so they can read their watch. Worst UX ever!
That's plausible. I can also see Apple thinking there's no way Sony, Samsung, or anything MS would be a good iWatch. So they spread the rumor, sees who bites, and then figures out what's wrong with the early entries to see if they can do much better. If they cannot, they'll just bag it.
n/t
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
It's probably more like the "Apple TV" rumors. Steve said he thought he had a good living room device, and that got into it s autobiography. I have an Apple TV, so I knew he was talking about the existing product (which has never sold well, but really works well). But all the analysis took it to mean they were going to make a whole television set. Really? Who would buy an Apple branded television?
The smart watch is not a particularly good idea. It might be a reasonable niche product as a fashion accessory, or a a watch replacement for people who are used to wearing them. But the screen it to small fulfill a lot of smartphone applications, which makes it a poor stand-alone device. As a result it's unlikely Apple would release a product that would fit the definition of a "smart watch" that's been talked about in the media. It's more likely someone simply misconstrued something they heard form their Apple source about wearable technologies being developed at Apple.
I would like to question a related but opposite question:
Should people want even a dumb watch? One that just tells the time, and maybe has an alarm and calendar.
Years ago I worked at a place where there were a number of radio astronomers. One carried a flip-open clamshell watch that was entirely plastic (no electronics) and contained only a 3D replica of Stonehenge. Worked for him... (You can still buy these. Google Stonehenge Watch.)
It isn't obvious to me that constant preoccupation with the exact time is a boon to humanity. It may be necessary in our culture, given the scheduling of media to quantized fraction-of-an-hour time, and the need to coordinate for appointments, and not have railroad trains run into one another. But other human societies have worked differently, and perhaps they work better in some ways. Or at least differently.
A wonderful and breezy introduction to cultural perceptions of time (and space, and lotsa other things) can be found in Edward T Hall's 1959 _The SiIent Language_. While this isn't even Hall's final word on the subject (see Wikipedia or Amazon) I bought a copy for $0.10 at a used book store back in the late 1970s, and reading it has helped me tremendously dealing with foreign-culture customers, travel. and even my foreign-citizen wife.
I mean you can configure this stuff on your phone so that it only notifies you about stuff that actually merits a notification.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
> owns Gear
> walks around with Galaxy Note 3
> is an IT consultant
> chooses to speak loudly at wrist instead of using headset
Extreme levels of aspergers detected.
About 10 percent don't mind looking like dorks and wearing useless technology, because they can pretend they're in a sci-fi movie. The other 60 percent haven't been able to find their receipts.
What are you, a jock?
I drank what? -- Socrates
Perhaps, but people said almost the exact same thing about phones when the iPhone came out. "This is huge. Who wants a phone that big? It's so much bigger than my Razr. I think right now, people would be happy with a phone which simply vibrates makes calls and doesn't try to fit a computer in your pocket." And a few years later, here we are.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
You can add to that list: > Owned all models of Casio watches with games and calculators since such were available in the late 1970's. > Built his own computers from a kit of parts (I mean with a soldering iron, not cards that just plug in!). > Programmed in FORTRAN on cards that were run on an IBM System 3. Yah, I may be on the extreme end of geek but no actual diagnosis of Autism... I stand by my favorable review of the Gear. Just replied to a text message via speech-to-text while I was driving to a customer call without taking hands off the steering wheel. They are fining drivers like crazy on the part of Ontario where I live for any non-handsfree cell activity.
Officially a geek since 1984
Recently I attended a small dinner party. After dinner, everyone gathered in the living room, ostensibly to play board and card games. I ended up being the only one paying any attention to the game, or anyone or anything else. The others were too busy constantly checking Facebook or whatever else stupid shit on their smartphones. The Whole Damn Evening. It looked for all the world like I was sitting in a gathering of zombies mindlessly poking at their little screens, grudgingly deigning to be interrupted only when it's their turn to play.
It was so wrong on so many levels -- not least of which is that it's just poor manners. Why invite guests to your home if you're going to ignore them? Are you too busy tweeting about your party to actually mentally join the same space your body is physically occupying? Are we all too boring for each other? Has the "like" button become a substitute for conversation?
An amusing parallel presented itself. Author Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma) philosophizes, a bit tongue-in-cheek, that we humans don't use corn so much as it uses us to spread its genes around the planet. Corn cannot spread itself, so it's found a way to make us its servant. Are the technological gewgaws doing the same thing? Are humans just hosts for the proliferation of electronic parasites? Are we simply becoming part of a global machine, a la Lawnmower Man?
On second thought, perhaps it's not so amusing. It's just sad. It's not like anyone gives two shits when people they sorta know get a new pair of shoes, or are sitting at Starbucks, or has this trendy new political opinion. Ask them; they don't. Yet they cannot help themselves. They must watch the feeds and occasionally add their own half-sentence of nonsense to the meaningless chatter. It's becoming the dystopian "hive-mind" where the "social network" exercises more control over thought and behavior than does the individual himself. Let's not kid ourselves: someone who spends multiple hours per day on Facebook is, in some way, controlled by it.
That I'm right, and you don't like it, doesn't mean I'm a troll.
Yes. It's crazy, I know. Probably takes almost a whole second. I'm wasting my life away with all the time I spend pulling my phone out of my pocket.
I've been wearing a Metawatch for almost 2 years now. I have always worn a watch before and like the added functionality of notifications and data from my phone.
I can get 2-3 days life from the metawatch, but charge it nightly.
If my metawatch died I'd be shopping for another smart watch, probably a metawatch frame, but I'd check out the other options before I bought something.
It's nice to not have to take out my phone all the time to check calls, texts, emails. my watch vibrates and I check it to see if I need to take out the phone and deal with it.
It depends on what the decision criteria is. If it's something like "if the caller is in a certain address book group, answer; otherwise ignore" then sure. If it's something like "decide based on the email subject line, which could be any of a million different things" then that's harder to define programmatically.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
20 years too late? Similar gadgets have been introduced and failed long before that. Seiko wrist TV is but one.
There were many examples. Timex had a watch that would sync calendar and reminders which required you to point it at a IR transmitter (for laptops). I had one and the sync failed far too often. At least it looked like a nice sports watch.
Motorola had a wristwatch pager called the Mermaid that was a large device as well. I couldn't find a link except to another collaboration between Timex and Motorola. I think there were others.
The watch space feels like the early mp3 player market. Many people trying to crack the code for what consumers will jump on but nobody quite yet has a break out product in usability and features.
I love the sound of distortion in the morning -- webcommando
You win teh interwebs. :D
I got a smart watch (Sony MN2) last year because I kept missing the vibrate on my phone for meetings and calls, because my phone isn't always in my pocket. I thought that if I had a device on my wrist, I'd always get the buzz and never miss anything important.
SIMPLE task for the device, no? But it failed miserably.
Reason: Same as Windows CE back in the day. The device wasn't up to the job, because it was busy trying (miserably) to do a hundred other things that it simply wasn't suited for AT ALL.
- There were multiple "apps" on the watch, including for things like Twitter and Facebook
- But the screen is by nature so tiny and the device so limited, these were laughable rather than usable
- Rather than focusing like a laser on doing tiny-device things well, this led to compromises:
- Unusable touchscreen (inaccurate, insensitive)
- Useless battery life (lucky to make a day, often less)
- Worst of all, the device had to be tethered to be useful; lose tether, and it is effectively a bracelet
Compare to Windows CE:
- There were multiple applications on the devices, copying most MS desktop applications of the day
- But the device was by nature so tiny and so limited, these were laughable rather than usable
- Rather than focusing like a laser on doing mobile-device things well, this led to compromises:
- Crappy display, crappy resistive touchscreens, inexact and unpredictable input methods
- Useless battery life (lucky to make a few hours, often less)
- Worst of all, CE devices had to be synced to be useful; fail to sync several times a day and they were a data prison or data corrupter, rather than a data aid
The experience with the Sony MN2 was much the same as what I remember from CE: constant nursing the device along, excessive time spent trying to "make it work" for the most simple tasks, paying WAY TOO MUCH ATTENTION all the time to the connectivity (your body and its attention are pressed into service as the mechanical tool that keep the data flowing) to ensure that it was regular and sound, no intention to try to use any of the laughable features, and continuous frustration (Oh god, the battery went dead/I lost bluetooth sync/something went wrong and I can't tell what it is on this tiny screen device with no error reporting, I didn't get buzzed about that meeting/call, WTF IS THE POINT OF THIS SHITTY DEVICE AND ALL THE TIME I SPEND NURSING IT ALONG ANYWAY?)
Wrongheaded.
I presume that if Apple decides to build one of these, they will have better success, given their reasonable HCI and design and decision-making chops.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I owned that Databank watch. It was so badass. It was a real panty dropper in junior high.
connectivity along? This was my big gripe with the Sony MN2 (see my other comment in this story). I wanted it to do some basic things: notably, to give me a buzz about events (messages, calendaring, calls). It failed miserably at this task, because keeping it charged and connected to the phone all the time in the daily flow of life turned out not to be possible without making "Sony MN2 management" a new part-time job for myself. A distant second reason for failure (but still deserves mention) is that the touchscreen was so worthless that when it did manage to buzz me, I spent a comical ten minutes tap-tap-tapping on my screen just trying to get my taps to register well enough to see what the buzzing was all about.
It was much faster and less labor intensive in the end to continue what I'd been doing, and what so many others do: fish the phone out of my pocket regularly every ten minutes to see if anything was going down.
I thought about Pebble, but the Sony product made me gun-shy about smartwatches for the general consumer market a this point (though I'd still give an Apple product a look—but without much hope that it would work for me, since I use an Android phone now).
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
When you open that box in 10+ years, you will be disappointed to find that the resin band will have decayed and crumbled.
The Gear looks like a fine product, but what annoyed me was the camera built onto the band. If you're going to pay more than $40 for a watch, it had better damn well use a STANDARD band interface, and not require a special band. Even if that means doing without the stupid camera.
EDIT: s/indiscreet/discreet/g
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Almost half of those returns were exchanged for Blackberries.
I'd like to hear from more people with smart watches who are happy with them, to better understand the appeal.
Hey, I really like my new smart watch! Now, I don't have to take my phone out of my pocket to know what time it is.
I almost purchased a Pebble, because I specifically want a fuzzy clock with english sentences for the time (e.g. quarter of six)
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Did anyone in Star Trek ever wear a watch?
I think people are looking to be Dick Tracy...
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> Apple doesn't release half-baked products.
Nobody with any experience in HCI thinks that the puck mouse was anything apart from half-baked. And the iPod shuffle with no buttons at all is pretty brain-dead, as validated by them putting a button back on the next version.
Also FatPhil on SoylentNews, id 863
Apple didn't invent a lot of things.
Umm, really? This is just the last 40 days or so... True, they didn't invent a lot of things, but they do invent A LOT of things. I double-dog dare you to search the USPTO site. They are crazy prolific at inventing things.
What are you, a jock?
Might be a Pragmatist.
I used it to read ISBN barcodes and then lookup the book on Amazon and screenscrape the details into a table. It worked pretty well.
Is that if this were an Apple product they'd be selling 10s of millions of them, with iSheeple lined up around the block weeks in advance so they could get their greasy hands on one, use it for a week, and then put it in a drawer never to be used again. They'd never DARE attempt to return it.
You and I are in nearly identical scenarios. I bought a Galaxy Note 3 and Galaxy Gear watch together. I agree with everything you've said, and I also run my own exchange server. To build on your helpful assessment of Galaxy Gear (on of the only helpful ones here), and to give other people an idea of how the device is helpful, I'd like to add:
The device is extremely convenient in settings where having your phone out is considered rude. This is because you can continue to stay informed by using the watch without giving the appearance that you're playing/working on your phone. This is great for meetings or conferences, dinner with the wife/girlfriend, college classes, etc. As a motorcycle rider, I can tell that I will never go without a smartwatch again. It is much faster and safer to check messages, make/answer calls, and check notifications from the watch rather than taking my riding gloves off, pulling the phone out of a zipped pocket. You can safely stay informed while you ride by glancing at the notifications on your wrist. I no longer have to stop what I am doing at home/work and go pickup my phone off the charger/desk. I can answer calls, and respond to text messages without going to get my phone. As somebody that works full time for the state, runs a part time consulting business, goes to college part time, and runs a household filled with a woman and children, I can tell that TIME IS PRECIOUS to me, and the smart watch is a huge time saver.
I think most of the smart watch haters here either can't afford the $300 convenience fee for the device, or they are disappointed by the lack of "...sunshine up their butts." as you said.
Let's make like a bird... and get the flock outta here.
Full disclosure upfront: I am an early Kickstarter backer for Pebble. I do try an not let that make me biased in this comment.
My requirements in a smart watch are the following:
-Fully customizable watchface which can be displayed at all times (it's a watch; I shouldn't need to do anything just to see the time)
-Battery must last more than a couple of days. The longer the better. A whole week is a good start.
-It must be able to be fully submersible in water so I may shower and swim without any care
-The band must either be made of a durable fabric that is easily cleaned such as nylon or user replaceable in available sizes (skin condition)
-It needs to be able to provide useful alerts with contextual text to alleviate the need to pull my phone out of my pocket or run to it's location
-Further interactive functionality with my phone is a bonus
Why I prefer the Pebble:
The Pebble is by no means the perfect smartwatch. It even has a manufacturing flaw that I doubt will ever be addressed (rainbowin display in the sunlight). That being said, it ticks all of the above boxes. My phone is either in my pocket, near by, or on the charger up stairs. When ever I get a text message, phone call (Caller ID with the option to send to voicemail), e-mail, IM, meeting notification, reminder, or any other alert of my choosing, it displays on my watch. Through a 3rd party app, I can choose what app alerts to send to my watch. If I get too many alerts from an app, I can just have it not send to my watch. In many cases I get an alert that I just need to read and not respond to. When I'm on-call for work, I can see who's calling and whether it's worth running up stairs to my phone or getting out of bed to answer. I can also change music tracks or stations from my watch and they don't need to directly support Pebble either. In the car, I can change without taking my eyes off the road. Doing the dishes, I can change without getting my phone wet or it be near the sink.
The fact that an application doesn't need to natively support Pebble is a big plus. Any smartwatch needs to have an accompanying SDK and should leverage the existing APIs from the phone's OS to be able to integrate. Another cool thing I've got working is my phone security goes from a simple swipe to PIN requirement to unlock whenever my watch is out of range or the BT turned off; if someone happens to pick up my phone and walk off, it will lock with the PIN regardless if the screen is on and they're using it. Lastly a cool feature I should mention is I just need to flick my wrist in order for the backlight to come on so I can see what it says in the dark or use as a low light short range brief flashlight (I do this about once a week).
I have looked at the other smartwatches out there (here's a good list) and all of them had something missing or a poor attempt from my required list. Features like being able to take voice memos, use it as a headset or speakerphone, take pictures, and have a full color touch display are nice, but not one of my requirements. I'd wager the simplicity of physical buttons is better on a smartwatch than a touchscreen since one doesn't need to look at it to execute a command; a couple of examples would be glancing at an incoming call and dismiss it or changing tracks without looking.
I think the Galaxy Gear is a cute initial attempt from Samsung, but they have more work to do. Only getting text messages on the watch is silly. I don't need to be told I have a new e-mail since my phone already did that; let me see at least a snipet of the e-mail to determine if it's worth my time. I'd say Samsung has more work to do to open it up to other apps and phones not built by Samsung within the past year.
Check out Pebble. Part of what I like about it is it's simplicity. As long as it's in range, it will receive alerts. Not in range, it still tells the time with any watchface, There're apps like a stop watch, timer, or even snake that works without the phone; exiting one of those apps kills it and the process doesn't run in the background. If it looses BT connection, it will reconnect without intervention. I use this as a security method to change my phone from a swipe to unlock to a PIN to unlock; it locks the phone the moment it's out of range and returns the security when it is.
I forgot to mention, that I truly love the simplicity of it. It doesn't have a bunch of background processes unnecessarily running in the background unlike my phone. Battery life is nice. I average 8 days on a charge. With light weeks (only a few alerts), I've managed 11 days. This past week was a busy week and lasted 7 days which hadn't happened since old firmware from 6-7 months ago. Turning BT off will make it last even longer. In the future, they're suppose to enable BT 4.0 Low Energy which should extend the batter life when coupled with a phone with BT 4.0 LE.
The question is will it be valuable like an Apple I, or just a curiosity like a PalmPilot or a CueCat? Selling an original Apple I will pay for a lot of retirement. Selling a CueCat won't.
Nice try. I have half a dozen CueCats in storage and you are not going to trick me out of them with your clever schemes!
I'll trade you my Samsung Watch for all six.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Would you say that about the original price in 2007 too?
He didn't say anything about "get[ting] work done", which is ironic with people complaining about the iPad by saying "you can't do real work on it" (despite the fact that many people ARE doing that, even though yes, it has been marketed largely as a consumption device).
He said:
It can provide unobtrusive notifications and quick, easy access to small but important pieces of information. It can also be an input device for controlling Glass, one that's a lot more convenient than the frame-mounted touchpad
which I read as mostly an output device with a *little* bit of control, but not a major input device.
Which is why I qualified my statement "with few notable exceptions, and almost none in the last decade..." The puck mouse is almost 15 years old. And it wasn't half-baked in the sense that it was filled with bugs, had poor battery life, or was released before it was ready. It was a well-made product that worked as it ought to; it just happened to be an ergonomic nightmare.
I still wear one. I even use the scheduler. I love having the little 2-week preview with dots on the days with events (a dot on the current day will blink). It sucks that Casio discontinued them not too long ago.
My friend in high school had a Casio watch that doubled as a TV remote. The only use he got out of it was changing the channel on the TV whenever we watched a video in class - used to drive teachers batty trying to figure out what was going wrong and none of them ever did - I don't know how much it cost but man, worth every penny!
And people were still going nuts at the "under-$1000" price point because while nothing came close to the iPad, it's closest competitors were at least $2,000.
When the introduced the iPad at $500 it was a phenomenally low price.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
If what they could do is get a wad if cash on kickstarter and then release a poorly functioning watch, then yes they nailed it.
It took what, 6 months after their official release until they patched it to stop randomly un-pairing itself?
maybe u need a smart watch that looks like a traditional watch.
it could have a metal dial that points to different positions on the watch face depending on who is calling, with the ability to program in 11 of your fav callers with a twelfth position reserved for all other calls. Could do the same for txt and email messages, with a small, date like dial that rotates to indicate if it's a call, email, or txt.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
The Swiss don't exclusively own the high end. The Japanese have wicked watches, there's Seiko and their partner Orient. Seiko has a higher-end name called Credor, and they've made some outrageous stuff.. how about grand complication with sonnerie, based around the SpringDrive movement?
Feel too lazy to type links so just look up Credor, Grand Seiko, Spring Drive. Also Credor Torque and Credor Sonnerie. I'm not gonna type the links for you. Use the google!
What makes Seiko so special? They make everything. They don't buy movements from someone else -- like the swiss do -- and then finish them themselves. Seiko makes everything -- the steel the case is made of, the crystal, the dial, the markers, the glue that glues the markers to the dial, the jewels, the spring that holds the jewel, the lube that goes between the jewels, they make the mainspring, the crown, the stem, every single piece of the movement, the hairspring, etc.
The only other watchmakers than can boast complete construction of every piece of their watches is Patek Phllipe, Jaeger and maybe even Panerai. Everyone else buys from ETA or Jaeger. Cartier? Jaeger. That obnoxious 52mm penile extender? ETA. Bell & ROss? ETA. Omega? ETA. ETA ETA ETA. Jaeger and ETA makes most watches' movements for Europe.
And lastly, if you think Rolex and IWC are the high end, well... I'm sure Patek Phillipe, Seiko and Jaeger would dispute that claim.
Go ahead, do your googlin' and youtubin'. Spring Drive will make your head explode. ETA tried and failed miserably to copy that. It took Seiko almost 30 years to perfect it.
What's on my wrist? A 1968 King Seiko, handwind, no auto. Keeps to plus or minus 2 seconds every 24 hours. Hand-made. Fanatical attention to detail. Don't bother, you won't find a 44KS unless it's from ebay, never sold outside japan.
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
I have had each version of the Sony Smart watch, from the first Live View "watch" back on 2009 to my now 2nd gen Sony Smart Watch. what i learned is that, YOU NEVER BUY the first of anything type of new tech, the 2nd one is always better because end users finally get to test them for real and let the devlopers know what needs to be fixed/added/imporved. Everyone I run into / or sees my watch from the other side of the room comes over to ask. People in elevators are always interested on why i am looking at my watch.. i say "i am reading my Face Book time line.." then i have to go into how it will show incoming tweets, incoming calls and can answer them or reject them with out taking my phone out of my pocket. If you are looking for a Wrist Phone, these are not them.. this is NOT Dick Tracy or Bat Man style that the commercials show, as the SamSung and Sony Smart Watches hook up to your Smart Phone.. so you still have to carry around a brink. Now if you want a Watch Phone.. check www.Tinkgeek.com or ebay.com there is a TON of them out there for well under the price that Samsung is trying to sell their BS watch for. so all in all.. Go with SONY they are already on the 4th version and it is cheaper and does more as there has been apps written for them for YEARS now.
This watch seems to do everything your require either as an interface to your phone or as a standalone phone.
http://omate.com/
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Did anyone in Star Trek ever wear a watch?
Yes!
I cannot believe I am on Slashdot right now.
I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
I had a friend, Terry, who was around two hundred and eighty pounds. He bought one of those. Luckily for him, it came with a small stylette for pushing the minuscule buttons. His finger was damned near as wide as half the watch. Funny as hell to watch him hunched over (why, I don't know) poking tiny little buttons with his face about six inches away.
The tablet computers and the iPad style tablet are completely different products. The iPad is more like a netbook in a different format. The $2000 tablets were full fledged notebook computers with reversible touch screens.
Why not just sit down and use a laptop rather than trying to be Star Trek? You might actually get work done, and save a ton of money in the process.
I have a desktop machine (12-core Xeon, 64 GiB RAM, with two large monitors), a laptop (MacBook Pro), a netbook (Samsung Chromebook), a Nexus 7, and a phone. Every single one of those devices has its place, none of them are redundant and they're all good for different things (though I think I could merge the phone and tablet into a phablet).
Likewise, Glass and a smartwatch will have their place. They're not an alternative to a laptop, they serve different purposes. Specifically, they're for times when I don't want to have to even pull out a phone or a tablet out of a pocket, much less get a laptop or netbook out of a backpack. In addition they're for times when I don't even want to have to fill my hands with a phone or a tablet, much less try to balance a laptop on something.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I'd like to know if anyone here owns a smart watch made by anyone other than Samsung? The Sony one, for example, seems more capable and compatible with more devices than the Galaxy Gear but I don't know anyone who has actually bought one.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
I think the word you are looking for is "discreet".
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I have been wearing Casio Data Bank watches since my high school days. However, I found Casio stopped making them (still wear and use 150 model) since it has a calendar/scheduler to show this current and next weeks, alarms, calculator, phone books, etc. I like it for being small and light because of my disabilities. I can't show a phone correctly to use and is tiring for me. I also don't use the phone due to my impediments. I don't mind having Internet, but not required since it is expensive and capped. :(
I saw people use their (6/six)th generation iPod Nanos as watches, but they do not have the features like in iOS like on big iPods, iPhones, and iPads. :(
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Interesting! I knew about ETA, of course (owned by Swatch) but not about Seiko. There are one or two Seikos on the Indian eBay shops that looked pretty nice, as it happens. Today's lunchtime internetting sorted, thank you!
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs," I said. "we have a protractor"
As events over the last decade should show you, patenting != inventing. Half those patents are obvious - worse, software - and the other half are already announced products by someone else (oh, Apple's patenting flexible glass? What a cool invention! LG might not be too happy about Apple patenting it now that they've demoed it though).
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Nobody uses the iPhone as a phone. That's why nobody saw it coming. It was all a ruse to make PDAs cool again.
I remember my first thought was, "It doesn't fold. I'll get my face grease all over it. Yuck!"
Yup, they fooled me, too.
Since when does having a US patent prove you invented anything?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I'm really happy with the almost-smartwatch Pebble. I wear it in preference to my other watches (and I've always worn a watch). There are three things I like most about it:
I have gotten more positive comments about this watch from strangers than any single other thing I've ever owned. I've been asked about it on public transport in NYC and in check-out lines in Philadelphia and London, and at twice I've had people literally stop mid-sentence to ask about it.
They probably already have the lawyers ready to bring up the submarine patent.
Oh, how convenient: a theory about God that doesn't involve looking through a telescope.
Fair enough(due to my disinterest in actually owning either, I haven't been in a position to distrust-and-verify every alleged capability on the spec sheet, just what they say they can do, plus first-impression type reviews).
My point was that Samsung built a product that could not possibly have not sucked (short of unobtanium fuel modules that don't exist or something), while Pebble adopted a spec level that (while they could certainly fuck it up), can actually be done with contemporary technology.
Whether you can succeed at executing the possible is what distinguishes good engineering from poor engineering. Attempting to succeed at executing the impossible shows a form of incompetence that nullifies even your finest engineering prowess before you start.
Fair enough. I agree with that. As to whether Samsung's 'vision' of what a smart-watch should do is valid or not, I think it was definitely pushing things a bit, but 1-2 days of battery life is semi-reasonable, they just had to bulk it up '1980's calculator watch' dimensions to make that happen.
I returned mine, because I wanted a Gold version, which I hear is lucky, because it attracts thieves.
Really stupid thieves ...
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Lindsay? Is that you?
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg