Slashdot Mirror
It's Time To Admit Apple Watch Is a Success (imore.com)
At company's quarterly earnings call, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the holiday period was the company's "best quarter ever" for Apple Watch -- both units and revenues -- "with holiday demand so strong that we couldn't make enough." He added: Apple Watch is the best-selling smartwatch in the world, and also the most-loved, with the highest customer satisfaction in its category by a wide margin. Apple Watch is the ultimate device for a healthy life, and it's the gold standard for smartwatches. We couldn't be more excited about Apple Watch. Long time Apple commentator Rene Ritchie writes: There's a strange narrative in the tech community concerning Apple Watch being a flop, a failure, or in some way, shape, or form, a disappointment. It's particularly bizarre given Apple Watch, as part of the wearable market, is doing record numbers. It could be that there is no real "Smartwatch market", just an Apple Watch market. Much like there's no real "tablet market", just an iPad market. Since it's such a new product category and most of the existing products are still bound to phones, it could also simply be too soon to tell.John Gruber adds: I think we should stop talking about "smartwatches" and just consider Apple Watch a "watch", period. In September, Apple claimed watch revenues second only to Rolex. How can it not be considered a hit at this point?
I feel like it's just a matter of perspective. The watch market as whole has never really been as significant as the phone or PC market, thus comparing the apples watch compared to iPhone or Mac sales makes it look like a failure, but within it's sector it is a strong competitor. It certainly hasn't take then world by storm the way that the iPad and iPhone have been able to, but at least hast been a strong contender for watches. So I'd say the watch has been a viable product, but no great success.
My smartwatch was $35 including shipping. It has SD and SIMM card slots, and is a fully functional smart phone complete with camera.
My only complaint, no health sensors beyond accelerometer apps.
Why is the Apple Watch (and the rest of its competitors) so expensive? Are red and green LEDs that much more expensive?
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
I've seen more Rolexes than Apple Watches. Microsoft also did this with Windows Phone when they talked about 'revenue' rather than any hard sales figures. The reality everyone else knew finally dawned.
They made the Apple Watch because they wanted a watch. There is no problem that the watch solves. So, it's a solution looking for a problem.
> Much like there's no real "tablet market", just an iPad market.
Nonsense, Android sold more units. Just like the phone market is really an Android market.
You know what I see EVERYWHERE? iPhones
You know what I see NOWHERE? Apple Watches
I look around the train on the way to/from work every day and I see almost nobody wearing an Apple Watch. Garmin's and FitBits seem pretty popular though.
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
Not having to take your phone out of your pocket. This seems like a small thing, but it was a game changer for me. I was at a party the first weekend I had it, and I realized I hadn't touched my phone in three hours. I can see what's important at a glance. If I'm working and my phone vibrates, it breaks my flow to pull it out and see if it's something that requires attention. With the watch, I just glance over, and know if I need to address it before it breaks me out of what I'm doing. If I'm biking I can see if a call is worth pulling off to the side of the road for. I know longer worry the whole ride home if the phone going off in my pocket is a crisis, or something I can safely ignore. If only I could leave my phone at home.
And worse, it's been proven that smartwatches and fitness trackers in general don't result in better health for users. Calling it the "ultimate device for a healthy lifestyle" is about as stupid as buying a rowing machine and sticking it in the corner to gather dust. It's just marketing. Yet another reason why actual numbers aren't released.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Nobody I know voted for Trump, yet he won with almost 50% of the vote. What's your point?
Outside your comfort bubble, people do different things. Intelligent people acknowledge this instead of screaming like a madman.
...that Slashdot admitted they're just fucking Apple shills. The money is too great for such a BUSINESS NO LONGER RUN BY AN INDIVIDUAL.
Prove otherwise, Whipslash.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Totally absurd.
Apple has sold millions of watches. They don't release numbers, but estimates were 12 million in the first year. So there are like at least 20 million watches, probably. Apple sells like 50-80 million iPhones a year, so by that standard, they are a failure. And as you say, you probably know plenty of people with an iPhone, and only a few (or even none) with an Apple Watch.
The thing is, the Apple Watch NEVER had to match or even approach the iPhone in order to be a success. The iPhone is a such a success story it is a goddamned joke. The iPhone is close to half of Apple in most years, and this is for a company that nominally will sell you a server or monitor, actually will sell you a notebook, a laptop, a tablet, a goofy gameboy desktop, a variety of mice, the aforementioned watch, a bunch of almost entirely profit accessories (now with more dongles!), a music subscription service, and takes a cut off of everything they have a hand in selling, and not a small cut either.
The 8 bit Nintendo sold like 60 million units total. You probably knew someone with one of those, but for different reasons. There are entire companies with less units shipped than Apple Watch, and that will remain the case indefinitely. If your standard for success is "everyone in the civilized world will either own one of these or feel its absence day by day", then the Apple Watch is a failure. But if it is anything sane, it is not. It is clear that the Apple Watch, as a project, is quite profitable for Apple. Each Watch costs Apple much less to make than it sells for, and they sell millions.
No, you and your friends won't feel obligated to own and operate an Apple Watch. That doesn't make it a failure, any more than an Xbone or PS4 is a failure just because most people own neither.
Outside your comfort bubble, people do different things. Intelligent people acknowledge this instead of screaming like a madman.
I think that is helpful for understanding things, particularly when reading /.
This is an extremely niche group of people who are not typical consumers.
This is also a group of people with rooting interests for and against certain companies/products which are so strong that they'd back the average european soccer fan blush for the partiality.
We should acknowledge the role that price drops and other promotional considerations have had, but really... Apple owns this entire market. Nobody has a credible competitor that's carved out a slice. It's another case of them, for all their faults, still eating people's lunches and leaving /.ers hand-wringing.
Maybe companies like Samsung and LG and Alphabet should ask themselves why they keep being late to parties and taking cues from Apple and improving their products instead of fragmenting their own platform?
An iWatch - 5 years from now, it will be removed from the drawer where it's been gathering dust and given to some infant as a chew toy because it no longer works with the latest phones, and it no longer gets updates anyway.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
and charge fast enough you can wear them while you sleep and just charge them while you are in the shower to get a full charge.
So, your life can revolve around charging the thing? Seems more like those little egg gizmos that tweeners used to try to hatch a couple of years ago. Who the hell is in charge here? (So to speak.)
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
If it's a success, nobody is required to admit, we'll see it everywhere and in the press, like iPods (in the past) or iPhones today.
Anyone selling watches is a fashion company. If the computer revolution had happened before President Kennedy, everyone would have smart hats. It's a profitable division of Apple that gets to reuse aspects of their tech side, and interface with their role as a technology company. But it is absolutely a fashion accessory, because that is what watches are. If you need a functional watch, you can get one for a few dollars, or probably just get a used one for free or almost free.
The Apple Watch is only a "flop" in the sense that people don't need them the same way they need a smartphone. Compared to any other wearable, it's a runaway success, but people don't think about it in those terms, because it is an Apple product.
Personally, I love my Apple Watch, but I'm old enough to be part of a generation that wore watches. I'll still put on my Rolex for dress-up occasions, but my Apple Watch is my go-to daily wearable.
For people who didn't grow up wearing watches, the Apple Watch may elicit nothing but "meh" from them. So be it ... it is not a device for everyone, but it is an excellent device for people who want to wear a watch that does more than tell the time.
Apple is not a tech company?
Only on /. :)
So then, every $50+ non-waterproof windable watches on the market are not "watches" by your definition.
Most of the kids I work with have an Apple Watch to go along with their iPhones. I have an iPhone and love it but I can't bring myself to replace my current watch, which is a 28 year old Rolex, with an ugly Apple Watch. I bought my Rolex in the 80s and made payments on it for a couple of years. I wear it nearly every day so from a value standpoint, if I did an ROI on it and tried to compare it's value to tech that will probably only last a couple of years, I am sure the Apple watch is not a good investment. Call me a snob but maybe if they can figure out how to put the Apple Watch guts in an Oyster case, I may be more interested.
I come here for news, not for people wanking over completely insignificant statics.
And that's what they are, the Apple watch is by far the best and most popular of a product category that the overwhelming majority of people couldn't care less about. I think I've seen like 2 of these things, both of them worn by people who work in IT.
The fact that they sold more than they could make is positive marketing speak for "even we thought it wouldn't sell".
IIRC, I saw an article a week or two ago that said "It's time to admit Apple Watch is a Failure." Seriously.
"Nobody I know voted for Trump, yet he won with almost 50% of the vote."
Trump got less than 46%, while Hillary got 48%
If this was a genuine success then they would not be trumpeting 'revenue'. Microsoft did exactly this with Windows Phone, along with the usual 'supply problems' and 'we can't make enough' crap, and the reality that everyone knew anyway gradually dawned.
There is one use-case for these things and that's fitness. That's it. There's absolutely bugger-all here that tells us the Apple Watch, or any other 'smart' watch that anyone else makes, is the runaway success they are claiming. However, Apple has become a self-fulfilling prophecy from a financial point-of-view. It simply has to continue to be a rampant success because so many have ploughed money into it.
The whole thing is sustained on a bubble of nothing. At least Jobs had something to back up the hyperbole and worked out why people would use the product he was trumpeting.
Is there one or a few "killer apps" that are driving people ot them or is it a big mix?
Fitness. That's it.
Trying to call the Apple Watch a failure is wishful thinking for those who hate it.
I see quite a few Apple watches as I walk around my city going to/from work. I'm seeing more Apple Watches, in fact, than any other single brand of watch. It's reached the point where I'm seeing more Apple Watches than other fitness trackers (though that's due more to a decline in fitness tracker use than Apple's success).
I don't know any of those owner's use case for the Apple Watch, and they sure as hell have no obligation to justify their consumer choice to me or anyone else.
So at the end of the day, I have to go with the reality I see, instead of falling back to "alternative facts" that support the narrative I like. I'm seeing a decent number of Apple Watches, and it's effectively the only smartwatch I see.
There's certainly nothing approaching the kind of penetration we see with smartphones, but as far as I can see, the Apple Watch is effectively the only smartwatch people buy.
Let's face it, this article is effectively /. clickbait - it'll generate a lot of comments (of which I'm guilty). There's a sizable portion of the /. readership who will instantly start frothing at the mouth at the merest hint of any Apple story.
Given the cancellation of a few anticipated Android cousins, we become all the more rabid should the Apple Watch be mentioned.
A story about the Apple Watch being successful? Just post it and watch the clicks roll in.
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
get all the useful functions I'd want on my watch--time, date, a stop watch (the last I virtually never use), and a light--with ZERO worry about charging/losing it/breaking it.
I want to thank you for giving me a reason to point out why the AppleWatch is more useful than a normal watch.
None of the things you list were enough reason for me to continue using a watch decades ago, when I stopped wearing watches. The Apple Watch finally lured me back into wearing a watch. Things like the time are OK but I could just use my phone for that almost as easily... the things I find the Apple Watch useful for are:
Workout data. This is obviously the #1 use and right off the bat collects data only fairly expensive watches can collect, not to mention that data is always piped to my phone which not as many fitness watches do automatically. The phone can collect some workout data but not things like heart rate.
Unlocks my computer. The fancy new MacBook Pros with a toucher are nice because you can unlock with a fingerprint, but honestly I find the watch unlock more convenient.
Weather. Nice to see weather at a glance without pulling out the phone.
Phone silencing. Oddly this is actually the mot useful feature. If I get a call when I don't want to take one (theater, meeting) without looking I just cover the watch with my hand and the call is sent to voice mail.
Untethering from phone. I leave my phone around the house and usually don't carry it with me at home. With the watch I can answer a call and not have to run for the phone.
Apps. These were of limited use before WatchOS3 as they would take too long to load, but after that update the apps have good refresh rates, so it's practical to use a watch app for something like Runkeeper or Pokenmon Go. Also consistently useful even before that update are single action apps like Uber and Chipotle...
The reason the Apple Watch is so useful is not any one thing, it's a combination of all the little things... I can understand how that would be hard to comprehend unless you have used one, but the reason they are selling so well is that many people have found them useful and are telling others.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It was ambiguous, but "this" in the GP post probably referred to Slashdot denizens. Which is an extremely niche group of people who are not typical consumers.
Or, at least, it used to be.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
I was at a party the first weekend I had it, and I realized I hadn't touched my phone in three hours.
It's almost as if you don't know that not looking at the phone is an option.
If only I could leave my phone at home.
You actually can!
No sig today...
Apple owns this entire market. Nobody has a credible competitor that's carved out a slice. It's another case of them, for all their faults, still eating people's lunches and leaving /.ers hand-wringing.
It's not a massive market. It's nothing like the original iPhone or iPod markets.
The reason people call the Apple Watch a failure is NOT because Apple is doing poorly in the market. The reason they are calling it a failure is because the Apple Watch has failed to make smart watches something everyone wants.
Personal theory: Most people, consciously or subconsciously, want to be LESS connected to their phones, not more connected.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
I'm not one to throw stones, but you might consider getting some help with that anger of yours. This topic is not worth the amount of emotion and vitriol you are investing it with.
Cheers.
Warning: Teh poster of this messaeg is lysdexic
I was at a party the first weekend I had it, and I realized I hadn't touched my phone in three hours.
and still stay connected
If only I could leave my phone at home.
and still stay connected
The bigger issue is why I am responding to a Slashdot comment
People don't use their exercise equipment after they've bought it? Wow. So... what do they hang clothes on?
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Keep telling yourself that. My TCO is way lower on my mac laptop and iPhone while my productivity is higher then on my android phone and windows computer because it doesn't die in flames regularly.
When first year sales were $6B, record quarters mean something.
$6B in revenue with $8B in expenses would not be a success, it would be a $2B disaster. Without the associated expense, revenue numbers are useless. Revenue numbers by themselves typically announced by a company when they're losing money on a product. If they won't release the expense number associated with the revenue, or they don't skip those and use profit instead, then a company is usually shoveling bullshit.
Why should they be remorseful?
He's doing exactly what he said he would do during the election...especially the supreme court nomination.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
And worse, it's been proven that smartwatches and fitness trackers in general don't result in better health for users.
Anecdotally, I actually get up from my desk and walk around at least once an hour to keep it happy. That doesn't suddenly make me a triathlete, but plenty of studies do show that me getting off my ass from time to time helps me not die.
I can't speak for everyone, but I have lost weight from trying to meet my daily calorie burning goals. Maybe that's not the common case, but I'm happy with the result.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Of course, an on-topic and thought out response involving neither ad hominem attacks or alternative truths drew out the downmods.
You could have just as easily have said "You have very aptly demonstrated all of the intelligence and thoughtfulness the majority of voting Americans perceive in supporters of Hillary Clinton and/or haters of Donald Trump" and it would have been just as true. The arrogance from either side seems perfectly formulated to totally tick off the other camp.
But I would suspect that the mods who downvoted you are getting a little sick of Donald Trump arguments being drawn into EVERY SINGLE TOPIC, political or otherwise.
Apple watch ? Shove it up your faggot ass, Tim Cook. And don't forget to set the vibrate mode and have all your faggot buddies call you.
What an unpleasant person you are. Are you a closeted gay person? They're the ones that most often obsess about openly-gay peoples' sexuality and bring it up all the time for no reason, usually with.. colorful expressions of gay sex acts that you claim to find disgusting.
> Conversely, from the same vantage point Apple Watch is clearly not on the same level.
Not same level != not success
Come on. Ferrari has been around for most of the history of cars, yet by your measure they're a raging failure compared to Cherry.
We could both make guesses, but they'd be wildly different and both are likely to be completely wrong. That's my point. You can't reasonably say "no one seems to be buying them", and I can't counter with "everyone seems to have one".
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Turn-by-turn directions while driving are really pleasant--just a tap on your wrist before each turn and the prompt on your watch.
Quick checking of text messages or emails while in a meeting or walking (and thus not wanting to pull the phone out of my pocket). Also includes quick (one word or emoticon) responses to text messages from the wife.
Music: viewing current song, previous/next song, controlling volume
Apple Pay: quick & convenient from the watch
Quick glance at my work calendar, prompts before meetings.
---
Agreed, there's no one thing, just lots of little things you get used to.
That's not a bad thing.
If your Apple Watch battery goes dead and you don't replace it out of frustration, Apple still has the money you spent on that first watch, even if it didn't last 20 years like the Rolex might. Apple doesn't have a "problem" there. What they have, is a second chance to sell you a watch.
I think of all the statements made, they all apply to the apple watch. there is an underlying tribal mentality, where some people love apple and some people hate it. With the iphone specifically, I think some people are entranced by android because it is perceived as "open" while iphone is a "walled garden". I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with any tribal viewpoints, just acknowledging that they are present.
WRT apple watch, just according to the sales numbers it is beating the pants off any other smart watch. and despite its limited funcitonality and tetherment to a phone, it actually accomplishes a whole lot.
tbh I am seeing more iWatches in the field. this says to me, if somebody is using it every day for more than a month, then the novelty factor is gone and they are getting real utility.
apple watch has nowhere to go but up. they're still on their first generation form factor and technology. there will likely be major improvements later this year, such as thinner and adding more features. Maybe even some day, untethering from the phone.
I had one myself, but I got rid of it. you know what made the difference? the fact that the screen is off until you raise it. there was always a split-second lag that made it impossible to just casually glance at the time. instead, it became a deliberate action where you had to pause everything and do it.
if apple can make the screen be on all the time, then I would greatly consider the iwatch again.
How do you know, by looking at your watch vs your phone, that the unknown phone calling you is not the hospital emergency room calling you because a loved one was just in an accident?
But if the phone is showing you an unknown number, how does that help you vs. seeing an unknown number on your watch?
Most newer car stereo systems have Bluetooth connectivity to your phone so you can see who is calling you and even answer the phone hands-free without ever touching your phone.
But that solution would require carrying a car stereo system to parties. Wearing a watch is less hassle.
Breakfast served all day!