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Apple Watch Still Waiting On App Developers
An anonymous reader writes: It's been almost three months since the Apple Watch launched, and the tiny device hasn't taken people's wrists by storm. That's not to say it's a failure — experts estimate Apple has sold between three and five million of them, and we may get more detailed sales information during their earnings call, tomorrow. But many major app developers are still missing from the Watch's catalog, and Apple doesn't have a good way of roping them into the new section of its ecosystem. "I don't know if we could get it all in there in a way that feels good and works well," said a Facebook executive. "Why would you look at a small picture when you can look at a large one on your phone?" said Snapchat's CEO. The app rush that hit phones and tablets is dampened for the Watch. For now, all Apple can do is improve their development toolkit and hope coders can figure out useful new wrist-based interactions.
This might bet the point at which Apple without Jobs falters.
You can't introduce the "revolutionary" new product and not have the killer use-case for it. You can't release "teh smartwatch" and have no idea of WTF people will use it for.
Wow, the ability to see my text messages without looking at my phone? Nope, not compelling.
The smartwatch has always felt like a gimmick with little utility for most people.
And this got cemented when they were selling the gold plated "gee but I'm a rich asshole" version. I'm pretty sure I've never heard a single person who could finish the sentence "I want a smart watch because ..." with anything substantive.
Android or Apple, I don't see any value in splashing out for something which they still are hoping someone will create the thing which makes it useful.
Sorry, no. Increasingly mobile consumer electronics are just vehicles for ads, analytics, and giving up my privacy ... and any app which makes use of this is more of the same. Some of us are moving to less digital crap in our lives, and not more.
This falls firmly in the camp of no defined purpose, no benefit, and not getting my money.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
On the other hand, you could have a watch loaded with a lot of mediocre apps that cause its power use to spike a lot, draining the battery and leaving you to charge it a few times a day. So either you end up taking the watch off once or twice a day or you end up with a cable linking your phone to your laptop or a wall charger.
Sounds like great options that are sure to drive adoption of the core product.
As a developer I hear people complain the watch does everything the phone is already used for, and that aside from aesthetic perfection of Yet Another Apple Device on ones person, there are a half-dozen android competitors that are easier to code for and arent tethered to apples comparatively draconian app store. Have other devs written anything interesting for it?
Good people go to bed earlier.
Meanwhile, my Pebble Time, which was recently released, has a ton of apps on it. And it lasts for 7 days, is 30m water proof, has an accelerometer for fitness or sleep tracking, and a microphone for text responding or other features. Oh, and a color display.
It connects to Android AND Apple devices. I can control music from it, read texts, check my calendar, and something else too, I can't quite remember, I think it has to do with a clock.. Oh well.
Why would I want an Apple Watch for more than twice the cost again?
I dunno. As an extension of your iPhone, it does fit in a niche. It's probably handy to use to see notifications, maybe some status updates, check in on real time data like weather, and to quickly check the current time like any other watch. It can probably serve as an always-connected fit bit or something like that.
But I agree that it is a solution looking for a problem. In the larger picture, I just don't see the form factor being conducive to a significant variety of applications. So it's useful to a subset of the population but not a must-have for most. And that will prevent it from being a runaway success. That is, until they can find a "killer app" that everyone wants to have. And I'm sure many people are working on ideas for that. Maybe someone will find that problem to solve. Maybe not. Even if they don't, I think enough people will find it useful enough to justify buying it and I think Apple will at least make their money back on the development costs.
There is a really good use for it. I am a cyclist. I use Strava to track my rides and the minutia (heart rate, cadence, speed, distance). I can mount my iPhone on my bars (meh) or keep it in my shirt back pocket. But there I can't see my stats unless I pull it out. Risky while riding, as I am sweaty and fumble fingered.
There is a third party blue tooth computer display (Wahoo Fitness Reflekt), but I haven't bought one yet. The reviews on it are so so, thus I haven't dropped the $120 for it. However, the Apple watch will display all my stats on my wrist. It works with Strava, so I will be satisfied. So I am likely to buy it solely for bicycling. The problems the watch will solve are out there, but they will take time to mature.
Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress
Background
- I'm a developer on iOS.
- My apps seem like good fits for apple watch (VLC Remote and VLC Streamer).
- I wear an apple watch.
Data:
Approximately nobody uses my apple watch app.
I don't use any apple watch apps.
My thoughts:
Having bought the watch, I can see why. It just isn't useful for quick interactions.
The default setting on the watch is that when you drop your wrist, it resets to the watch face, so every time you lift your wrist, you need to go to the launcher, find the app, launch it (wait some seconds) and then interact with the small screen.
There is an option to make the watch return to the point you left in the app - but in most cases, that isn't what you want for your watch. You do want it to show you the time when you lift your wrist 10 mins after you last used it.
On top of this, the things that could be useful like siri interaction are weak. Siri just doesn't work nearly as well as google now.
I keep wearing the watch because I like the activity monitor, but I don't even use my own apple watch apps.
VLC Remote for iPhone and Android