
Google Nears Smartwatch Launch - elias12
http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702304655104579165080029933904-lMyQjAxMTAzMDIwODEyNDgyWj
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ccozan
But I already have one : [http://www.motorola.com/us/MOTOACTV-16GB-Golf-
Edition/121481...](http://www.motorola.com/us/MOTOACTV-16GB-Golf-
Edition/121481.html)

is technically not a watch ( it does display the hour though) , but I saw its
power and I use the features daily. And looks totally geeky on my hand.

~~~
lmg643
i'm in the same camp. exercise + music is the best use case i know for a smart
watch.

if you could merge the garmin forerunner 610/620 (or equivalent running
program), and a bluetooth music player, that would be nirvana for me.

[https://buy.garmin.com/en-
US/US/prod122785.html#specsTab](https://buy.garmin.com/en-
US/US/prod122785.html#specsTab)

i like the running apps for iphone but i hate wearing it during a run or
workout. just extra weight i don't need.

~~~
ccozan
Yes, the nice thing about the MOTOACTV is that it runs independently, you can
sync it when you are at home, or near your Android phone. The music player is
surprisingly good and the headset is OK too.

Another nice one: if you decide to take the phone with you, it functions as a
wireless headset!

And the best of all: is fully hackable!! Some reference :
[http://blog.martinh.net/2013/05/hacking-google-
smartwatch.ht...](http://blog.martinh.net/2013/05/hacking-google-
smartwatch.html)

~~~
thrillgore
We actually use an Android app on a rooted ACTV, strapped to a hexacopter to
map out Wifi hotspots. It works in limited tests, but for obvious reasons we
would never take it out into the real world.

It's a really good, cheap, embedded platform. I wouldn't be surprised (despite
the so called firewall) that Motorola engineers are working with the WIMM Labs
folks on the Nexus Watch.

------
zackmorris
My ideal smartwatch would recharge itself from my body heat/movement, be
waterproof, have a cell phone/wifi, and best of all be pay-as-you-go. 90% of
the time I'd be on wifi so it would be free anyway like T-Mobile. GPS and
bluetooth would be nice but not critical.

But just being able to never worry about forgetting it, or having to charge
the dang thing, and be able to contact anyone anytime would be very sci fi.
And of course the most important feature of all would have to be: disabling it
easily to prevent interruption.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I see a day when devices won't need GPS when outside; access points/cell
towers can have precision/differential GPS receivers and your device's
location is calculated using RF signal strength/triangulation data (802.11ac
already uses beam steering for better reception/throughput). I'm aware this is
already done using CellID and signal strength data; I'm simply saying it'll
become more accurate and widespread.

If you can offload the energy hungry tasks, these devices become much more
realistic faster.

------
DigitalSea
Will smartwatches ever be a real thing? Everyone in the developed world has a
mobile phone, do we need another device that does the same things albeit
rather limited that our phones are already capable of doing? I like the idea
of Google Glass, but a smartwatch, really?

~~~
parktheredcar
Having had a pebble since shortly after they started shipping, I have found
that it's helpful to be able to glance at a summary of each notification that
comes in so I can address the urgent stuff and ignore the less important ones.
This is only for me personally, but quickly glancing at a sentence vs pulling
out the phone (,turning on the screen, getting distracted by other things on
that screen) is far less disruptive to whatever task I'm currently working on.

Of course there are plenty of downsides. Constantly glancing at your watch is
just as rude if not worse than looking at your smartphone in a meeting,
conversation, etc. As you mentioned, there is the high cost for a fairly dumb
device. Charging it. And depending on the person, every notification is wedged
that much further in to your daily life which is probably not for everybody.

I'm not sure there is a lot of value in a super interactive smart watch that
allows you to write texts, make calls and take pictures. The interface seems
to be small enough that it's kind of prohibitive among other things. But as a
read-only satellite device that displays information from a
smartphone/tablet/etc, a smart watch can definitely be a thing.

~~~
YeahKIA
Glance is the feature I love a lot on my Nokia as well. The glance screen
allows me to look at things like time on my phone without even turning it on.

~~~
VLM
I had a feature kind of like that on a flip phone about a decade ago, a really
small second screen you could look at without flipping open the phone, to see
who's calling or the current time, and battery level.

All you need do is standardize android phones to have a secondary screen on
the other side that never turns off or needs to be unlocked, eink or whatever.
Then transition that small screen to also display on your wrist.

~~~
snogglethorpe
That's great idea! Standardizing on an interface that can be implemented by
standard phones as well means there'd probably be much better and more
widespread support.

I suppose they could even support the "small secondary screen" interface on
phones without a physical secondary screen, by simply displaying its contents
inside the lock screen.

I used to have a foldable phone with a small secondary screen like that as
well; it really was nice, and would be even better if it didn't need a button-
press to activate (e-ink or whatever), as turning on the screen is always
about 80% of the effort when I just want to see the time... [they can't make
the button too easy to press after all, to avoid accidental activations...]

------
sigil
The only reason I'd wear a watch is to have something to look at impatiently.
Smartwatches are about to ruin this.

When you look at your smartphone impatiently, you could be looking at anything
-- because it can do almost anything. Watches have until now been about one
thing: timekeeping. And looking at your watch is (was?) a recognizable social
cue.

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aryastark
I don't see it happening, outside of tech circles that love tech toys for the
sake of tech toys.

The wristwatch market is a luxury market, one that abhors mass production.
They want mechanical over quartz. They want handcrafted, custom, exclusive
watches from far off lands. It's part jewelry and part status symbol. A mass
produced Google wrist computer from China is none of these things.

There are generally three types of people that wear wristwatches in 2013:
kids, dorks, and people with money. And I'm not so sure about kids today.

Google may be a bunch of smart people doing smart things. But they are
profoundly out of touch with consumers and what it takes to connect, on an
emotional level, products with consumers. Google Glass went as far as
alienating _tech people_. People that were on Google's side were stepping back
and saying "you know, Google might be losing their mind a little."

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aymeric
I can't wait for the moment I can Google something in the middle of a
conversation (to verify some points of the discussion) without disrupting it.

Do you guys use Siri for that? (I have an "old" 3GS)

~~~
wmeredith
Ugh, I'm an iPhone junkie, but talking to it in front of others is something I
can never see myself doing. Siri is a powerful tool (on the occasion that it
takes less than 45 seconds to respond), but using it like hopping on a Segway.
There's something so obnoxious about it, I can't bring myself to do it unless
no one is around.

~~~
taigeair
I tell Siri to read my emails in front of other people...

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bergie
Google Now sounds like something that would indeed work a lot better on a
smartwatch than it works now in a semi-hidden screen on your phone. Adding it
as a lockscreen widget sort of helps, but you still have to dig up your phone
and activate the screen to see the next bus departure or the status of your
flight.

Together with notifications it could easily be a big enough reason for getting
a smartwatch, sort of _Google Glass on your wrist_.

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mtsmithhn
I would love a smartwatch that acted as a 2nd display for my phone and
controlled things like music and workout apps such as Strava. Then I could get
updates on my HR, time, speed, music, location, who's calling me, text
messages, etc. without having to dig my phone out. When running I use a waist
belt with a water resistant pouch because anything else results in my phone
getting drenched in sweat and becoming unusable.

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beauzero
...am I alone or am I crazy? I am just not all that enthusiastic about a smart
watch or glasses. Until it puts me behind in information processing I just
don't care much.

~~~
saraid216
Some people have been waiting for personal augmented reality since they were
children.

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mpclark
Yawn. Wake me when somebody has some actual verifiable details.

~~~
WestCoastJustin
Google purchased WIMM [0], _a wearable computing device running a modified
version of the Android operating system_ [1]. Even though the WIMM website is
shutdown you can still access their app store [2] to get an idea of what is
possible.

ps. I hope we see an embedded Linux SoC, meaning that you do not need to
tether this with your phone, the watch is stand alone, and will likely replace
the phone down the road. Most other smart watches require that you tether with
your phone, which acts as the brain, so it makes programming difficult, and
battery life suffers, since you have radios talking.

[0] [http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/08/30/google-buys-
smart-...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/08/30/google-buys-smart-watch-
maker-wimm-to-boost-wearable-device-initiative)

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WIMM_One](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WIMM_One)

[2] [https://my.wimm.com/store](https://my.wimm.com/store)

[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_on_a_chip](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_on_a_chip)

~~~
m_eiman
A wrist-variant of Glass is more likely, though.

