
Pebble (YC W11) sells 400,000 smart watches in its first year  - yesplorer
http://www.siliconrepublic.com/digital-life/item/36220-pebble-sells-400-000-smart
======
mmelin
Last week I received my second Pebble, one of the new Pebble Steel watches.
I'm very happy with it, and it always generates some questions.

I usually describe it as the same feeling as using the Nokia N95 back in the
day; it's obvious the category is the future, but someone else will probably
make a smoother version of it in a couple of years (iPhone in Nokia's case,
who knows in regards to Pebble).

But just getting push notifications from Google Maps on your wrist when
walking around a new city is pretty amazing and feels like living in the
future, without having to wear a dorky Google Glass.

~~~
jnovek
I wish I could say the same thing about my Pebble. It constantly disconnects
from my phone and Pebble's support take 5+ days to respond with boilerplate.

Right now it's an overpriced plastic non-smart watch that I have to charge
every four days.

~~~
mmelin
Which phone are you using? I haven't experienced any issues like that with my
iPhone 5S. Charging is a pain, but I've given up trying to make it last
multiple days and just started charging it every night when I plug in my
phone.

~~~
jnovek
I'm using an iPhone 5.

I don't really have a problem with charging, it's just that it doesn't offer
any advantages over a normal digital watch right now and it still has to be
charged every few days.

I've tried a lot of things to get it to behave and at this point I'm pretty
sure my Pebble is broken. I would seek an RMA but Pebble support is like a
brick wall.

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talkingquickly
Have been consistently impressed with the way these guys have iterated on the
developer experience as well. The first version of the SDK was completely
usable although admittedly limited in what you could do with it.

We worked with them for a while before the official release of the V2 SDK to
put together the first automatic swimming lap tracker for Pebble [1] and they
were incredibly responsive and helpful when we ran into issues with it. They'd
clearly put a lot of thought based on the V1 feedback into how to make it a
better platform for developers to work with.

I think it's underestimated just how much work from such a small team must
have gone into getting a the developer experience as good as it is, only a
year after launch.

[1][http://www.helloswimio.com/](http://www.helloswimio.com/)

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mmorey
Congratulations to the Pebble team, I'm a big fan and have a app on their
store[1].

But the store needs some improvement:

* Paid apps are not allowed

* Sections default to the recently updated list which is encouraging frivolous updates to apps

* Developer support requests can take several weeks

None of these problems will stop me from developing apps for the Pebble
platform. I just hope they are at least thinking about app store
discoverability issues.

[1] [http://wristpresenter.com/](http://wristpresenter.com/)

~~~
stefan_kendall3
Neat app. My first thought was to put IAPs in the iOS app that controls the
pebble, and use IAPs to configure what the pebble application is able to do.

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Shank
I don't know if I wear watches than everyone else differently, but I tend to
leave mine on all night. Pebble has alarms that are silent, which is great,
but it didn't have the ability to turn off notifications during a period of
time. I'd get woken up by my phone more often than I would the alarm, so I
stopped wearing it to bed.

I loved the ability to get notifications on my wrist, but in practice it
produced mix results too: the default app on Android only supported a fraction
of the services I use, so I had to use alternative apps just to push
notifications to it. Then, it became a guessing game for what should or
shouldn't make my wrist vibrate.

Still, kudos to Pebble for being successful post-Kickstarter and selling a
lot. 400,000 units is nothing to laugh at for a project that started out
small.

~~~
apetrovic
You can turn off notifications during the night: go to settings,
Notifications, and set "Do Not Disturb" time.

~~~
Shank
Ooh, must be a new setting! How could I have missed that? Thanks!

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trevmckendrick
My bet is still on Apple creating THE device to collect data. I don't think it
will be a watch in the same way we think of these "watch" devices today.

They are probably the ones best suited to make a great product, combined with
the iPhone/iPad. They could benefit from owning both platforms in a way that
even Google can't with Android.

I might be overestimating Apple's abilities sans Jobs, but in an amazing
coincidence, this is a category where Cook has deep personal experience and
connections. He might be the perfect target user for this product, much like
Steve was for everything that came before it.

~~~
stefan_kendall3
I agree. This is the reason I'm going to try and get into WWDC this year. I
doubt they show hardware, but I bet we'll get first access at APIs and design
guidelines.

~~~
trevmckendrick
Disagree on this. The first thing Apple ever shows is hardware.

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georgespencer
I like the Pebble guys from what I see of them, but I can't help but feel that
Pebble will go down as a textbook example of first mover advantage being
short-lived.

Fundamentally there is nothing compelling about the technology or the design
other than the fact that they are sort-of first to the market.

Tablets make sense to me as a post-PC device. So far I haven't seen anything
that makes me understand why I'd want something on my wrist telling me about
the emails in my pocket.

~~~
51Cards
I am a big fan of my Pebble and I could extoll its virtues in many ways but
I'll just point out one in reference to your last statement "...in my pocket"

In my opinion that's exactly the point. First off when I'm working on-site I
don't want to pull out my phone every time it chimes at me to see what the
email or text was. When it alerts dozens of times a day you quickly learn the
advantage of a quick wrist glance vs. pulling it out and unlocking it over and
over.

Next, in meetings it's wonderful. I put the phone on complete silent and I get
a small vibe on my wrist that I can assess with a glance.

And lastly, I find it highly useful when it's not in my pocket. Around the
house I don't want to carry my phone, so I wear the Pebble. It will alert me
for texts or email, despite the phone being upstairs.

When I first got it I was very much in the "gimmick" camp... but 6 months in
now I am fully convinced that some form of wearable notifications are
something I will want. I'm excited to see where it all heads. The new Pebble
2.0 has expanded the use a lot with the new apps, but I also wonder if Pebble
is about to be steamrollered by the "big guys" like Google's new wearable
line. I won't tell anyone to go jump on-board just yet, but my experiences
already have convinced me that this is going to become a very common device
category in the near future. Especially as it matures.

------
deveac
I'm curious what percentage of smart watch wearers, having sported one for a
while, view their devices as _essential_ to having them on their person every
single day. Did the anticipated use cases map with reality? Execution-wise I
see a lot of complaints, but I wonder how much of what they're getting right
is still "wrong".

~~~
apetrovic
I can't say it's _essential_ to have it on the wrist every single day, but I
found it nice to have. And yes, my anticipated use-case almost completely maps
with reality.

Now, before I explain myself, a bit of disclaimer (apart from the obvious -
I'm not a native English speaker ;) ). I like to wear a watch, taking out the
phone from the pocket to check the time don't work for me. Also, for various
reasons I usually can't ignore notifications from my phone (my employer is in
different time zone than me, I have small kids, etc). So this is _my_ use
case, I have no doubt that other people have different expectations/needs.

The original Pebble looked too plasticky to me, Samsung watches are
abominations, we all hear that Apple and Google is cooking something but v1
from Google is usually a disaster and v1 from Apple is usually pricey, shiny
and pretty limited, so I ordered Pebble Steel in early January. My experience
so far:

\- I stopped checking the phone every now and then, especially during the
conversations/meetings - if there is some notification, I'll see it on my
wrist. No more "did the phone vibrated?" moments.

\- Having notifications delivered to my wrist is super useful when I'm home,
and the phone is not in my pocket.

\- Even more useful having a smartwatch is when I'm driving - instead of
pulling the phone from the pocket and trying to stay on track, I can just
glance on the wrist and see is it something important or ignorable.

All of these use cases is something I anticipated, and so far I'm happy. But
not everything is smooth:

\- I have an iPhone, the Pebble app on iOS don't work always as expected. So I
developed a habit to run the app in the morning, to prevent it to be kicked
from the memory.

\- Someone would expect to have basic watch functions on the watch. Pebble
don't have a stopwatch, so I need to run third-party app to measure time.
Which is nice, but Pebble OS don't support multitasking, so if I exit the app
(accidentally or on purpose - maybe I want to check time), stopwatch stops.
Same for timer applications. I would be nice if the OS have some basic hooks
for such essential functionality

\- Alarms are _dumb_. I can have working-days-only alarms on my old G-Shock,
but I can't have it on _smart_ watch?

\- Currently I can't buy a plastic/rubber/silicone wristband for my Pebble
Steel (because of "smart" case design), so I can't swim with my watch.

~~~
deveac
So use-case wise you think the implementation is on point, it just needs
better execution it sounds like...

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jw2013
I had one on for several days and then never wore it. Charging it is annoying
and just using it for a phone notification pusher does not do much for me.
Maybe it is the problem on me to expect 'the future is here' on a watch that
is nicely executed but nowhere near future is near type. I hope there can be
some great apps as they released ios/android appstore. I might change my mind
and put it on again if there are some great apps along the way.

But I very much admire Pepple's hard working in its involvement with tech
related events. Saw them talking and trying to let hackers write apps for them
in many hackathons, and that is great. And I know they were/are talking to
universities to offer discount, and that is great, too. To me that is a great
example of a YC company not satisfying with its current success and keep
pushing forward with determination. Way to go, pebble.

------
rubiquity
I'm curious as to what people think the future of Pebble is. Would I be a fool
for buying a Pebble today with the Moto 360 right around the corner? This
isn't rhetoric btw, I'm genuinely curious.

~~~
InXorWeTrust
It's really a matter of personal preference. I haven't been able to find much
on the Moto 360 (they seem to be keeping a bunch under wraps(I could be
looking in the wrong places though)). But I assume it has a LCD screen. Which
is potentially hell for battery life. The Pebble has around a 4-5 day battery
life for me. This isn't constant text messages though.

Another thing you might want to keep in mind: Moto 360 will only work on
Android. This isn't a negative for most people, except for those that might
want to get an iPhone in the future. Pebble works with both (for the most part
(from what I've heard, I have only actually experienced the Android side)).

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dijit
Mine's still processing and I bought it in January :(

~~~
joshstrange
I am very disappointed with my pre-order, I bought mine mid-February when they
were estimating by the end of the month and then (without even an email) they
changed my order to "backorder" status and changed the delivery dates to be
6-8 weeks. My card hasn't been charged yet and I could cancel but I've been
looking forward to getting one for quite some time so I probably wont.

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lnanek2
I wonder if they'll be smart enough to hop on the Google freight train and
implement Android Wear...

~~~
stefan_kendall3
Kindles still sell. Maybe there's room in wearable for different form factors.

The Kindle Fire is a disaster, but the main product is still wonderful.

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pinaceae
sold quantities, revenue figures - but no margins, no profits.

funny, this is a hardware business, not a software startup. running on losses
scales up quickly as you need to pay real money for every unit you build.
can't cheat costs as say whatsapp buy running lean and taking a lot of
shortcuts under the hood of the product - if quality is shit people will not
buy or return.

