The flood of major reviews of the Apple Watch is coming in, and they're consistent: Apple Pay is magical. Nice hardware. Third-party apps are pretty bad. Haptics are cool. 3D emojis are not. This is the best smart watch. Using one will take some getting used to. Joshua Topolsky at Bloomberg writes about how it's a fair amount of work to figure out which … [Read more...]
NYTimes Apple Watch Review: Rough and Revolutionary
We suspect that the New York Times jumped the gun this morning by publishing a full-on review of the Apple Watch, [UPDATE: other outlets have been publishing reviews today, too] even though Apple won't even start taking orders for it until Friday. On balance, though, we don't think Apple will complain too much. Tech columnist Farhad Manjoo pretty much ratified Apple's aims … [Read more...]
Diamond-Encrusted Apple Watches, In Case $17,000 Is Too Little To Spend
Much as we'd like to, it seems impossible to write about anything this week that isn't related to the Apple Watch, so we offer this: You may know that there is actually a business of gold-plating iPhones. (Android phones too, but that's not what we're talking about right now.) One would think that a $17,000 18k gold Apple Watch would be the top of the market, but one would … [Read more...]
The Apple Watch App Watch
The flood of updates to iPhone apps to make them compatible with the Apple Watch has started. The first wave came late last week, and included the expected suspects: Evernote, Uber, Twitter, Expedia, American Airlines, Starwood, and others. (You can expect that the first wave of reviews will focus on those apps.) And today, Apple opened the gates to all comers, inviting all … [Read more...]
Why the Apple Watch Sales Process is Overwrought and Won’t Last
9to5Mac continues to have deep coverage of exactly how Apple plans to sell the Watch, treading the fine line between selling a few-size-fits-all product like an iMac or iPhone to something that's more customized and personal. We do wonder, though, if all this fuss is a short-term thing. Think about it: an iPhone 6 comes in two styles (regular and Plus), three colors, three … [Read more...]
The End is Nigh, Says Swatch Co-Founder
The Swiss watch industry had a near-death experience when the Japanese started making electronic watches en masse. Now one of the saviors of the Swiss says that Apple, too, presents an existential threat. Elmar Mock, one of the founders of Swatch, told Bloomberg that he thinks Apple will soon sell as many watches as all of Switzerland, and that "[a]nything in the price range … [Read more...]
Apple Watch Wins Because Function Follows Form, Says Analyst
There's a very nicely reasoned piece on Ben Thompson's StraTechEry site this morning, arguing that Apple's emphasis on design in the Apple Watch is the very thing that will create demand for new types of interactions with devices. Essentially, Thompson argues, the function of wearables won't matter unless people are persuaded to wear them in the first place: There has been … [Read more...]
Want an Apple Watch? Think High Street, Not Main Street
So it's April 24, you want to buy an Apple Watch, but the lines at the Apple Store are too long. Sorry, but don't head to your AT&T store, because they won't have it. You may have better luck at a fashion retailer. WWD, the fashion bible, reports that the Watch will be available at a roster of stores not necessarily known for technology. Places like Galeries Lafayette in … [Read more...]
Android Wear Gets New Gestures; Details on Apple Watch
We're now into the war of public attrition between Google and Apple as details dribble out about Android Wear and the Apple Watch. None of it is worth a full article, but you may find it all worthwhile to know. (We suspect there's going to be a lot of this for the next month or so, by the way.) 9to5Mac is reporting breathlessly that the Apple Watch will contain 8GB of RAM, … [Read more...]
Functional Details of Apple Watch Start to Emerge
Now that the Apple Watch is truly out from under its covers, details about software and performance are starting to emerge. To answer the question of how long the battery lasts, Apple today posted a page setting power life expectation. They're saying the Watch will last 18 hours, assuming you check the time about five times an hour, get around five notifications an hour, use … [Read more...]