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The Problem with Apple Watch in a Nutshell
Thurrott News and Analysis for Tech Enthusiasts ^ | April 27, 2015 | by Paul Thurrott

Posted on 04/28/2015 1:30:17 AM PDT by Swordmaker

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To: Tzfat

My guess is most of it is just waiting for FDA approval. There’s a chicken-and-egg problem of getting enough models available for comprehensive testing, vs the LONG evaluation & approval times plus having too many people using the new product (very Apple behavior: it doesn’t exist until it’s available, or pre-announced as short before then as possible). By getting the Watch out there now, they can more easily engage in FDA product testing - quite possibly via fine print in the EULA (no reason, say, the pulse oxometer can’t record the data & send it back to Apple (with user’s permission of course, as always included in EULA) which then uses it anonymized for testing data). No reason to hold off selling the product with those sensors disabled by software until the FDA, after months or years, finally approves it; considering Apple has easily sold 5M Watches already (10M possibly), that’s no less than $2B revenue in just a few weeks - no point in holding it back for a small matter of delayed paperwork and software updates.


21 posted on 04/28/2015 6:43:04 AM PDT by ctdonath2 (Hillary:polarizing/calculating/disingenuous/insincere/ambitious/inevitable/entitled/overconfident/se)
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To: CopperTop
Love the Apple TV doo-hickey that went from buying the movie/TV show/whatever and having them stored locally to the we'll-let-you-watch-this-when-you-want-if-you-pay-us streaming device @ $14.95 a pop.

What the hell are you talking about? I have the latest model ATV (2 in fact), and 100% of my library comes from local storage (either rips of DVD/BD that I've bought or a handful of iTunes purchases - which are the same or less cost than buying physical discs, otherwise I'd have bought the discs).

22 posted on 04/28/2015 7:46:15 AM PDT by kevkrom (I'm not an unreasonable man... well, actually, I am. But hear me out anyway.)
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To: Tzfat

Some people aren’t crazy about gadgets. I am ... always have been.

I was beta tester for the Palm Pilot ... no back light!


23 posted on 04/28/2015 7:57:18 AM PDT by BunnySlippers (I Love Bull Markets!!!)
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To: kevkrom
I dunno. It's the little black Apple TV unit we got to replace the old white Apple TV unit when it started to get flaky. The old one, as I understand it from her, downloaded files directly from iTunes or whatever it is. It stored files locally and we never had much in the way of issues when it came to playing videos till it got very hot after a while of use.
The new smaller unit just streams from iTunes with no local storage. Again, as I understand it on info from her. And it gets very hot during use as well. It's black with no outer markings except for port ID and the company logo + TV. The same gizmo that hasta be power cycled when the mothership won't authorize a viewing of a previously purchased selection for some unknown reason.
That's what I'm talkin about.
24 posted on 04/28/2015 10:56:07 AM PDT by CopperTop
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To: Cringing Negativism Network
I’ll probably wait until someone has convincingly made a watch which communicates via cell phone, without a separate cell phone.

The Samsung Gear S does that now. . . but you still need a late model Samsung Galaxy phone to pair it with to activate it and install apps. You need a separate phone number for your watch.

25 posted on 04/28/2015 1:38:02 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: CopperTop
Love the Apple TV doo-hickey that went from buying the movie/TV show/whatever and having them stored locally to the we'll-let-you-watch-this-when-you-want-if-you-pay-us streaming device @ $14.95 a pop.
Thank you Mother. May I have another?

Did you not pay attention ability built into the newer AppleTV to stream content from your Apple Mac, iPhone, iPad, etc, where you have far more ability to store such movies locally that you could have stored on that older model? Or the ability of the new AppleTV to subscribe to services such as Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and many other services which have thousands of TV and Movies available at the click of the remote control? In so many ways it has more functions than that older model has. I can have movies on my Mac, my iPhone, my iPad, where I was watching them, and then decide I would prefer to watch them on my big screen and just send them there. Done.

So yes, may I have another.

As for your complaint about Apple's drives?

There was a legitimate reason Apple drives were more expensive than your PC floppy drives: they had an electric disk transport system and were built to Apple's standards, not to generic standards. Apple floppy drives had power eject, not a PC like button mechanical eject, so it would be extremely difficult for a user to accidentally eject a disk that still had open files on it. A PC user could always push the eject button and remove a disk in the middle of a save, format, or any other process, ruining a disk, files, Databases, etc., through carelessness. Apple's computers would always close all files before it would eject the disks. That meant far fewer corrupted files and/or disks. Apple carried the same philosophy over to their optical drives. I once read a study that showed over the life of an Apple drive, it more than paid for itself in the far fewer number of corrupted disks, fewer failed formats, and productivity lost in re-doing saves. Add that not many of them failed, so the cost of replacement was high, as the economies of scale could not kick in.

Apple users were and are willing to pay for that kind of attention to detail and long term savings that comes from using quality parts. So what if you can't just stick in just any off-the-shelf generic replacement that will fail to provide that kind of user experience. In the long run, it will cost more.

YOU would have preferred Apple be another big box computer maker made up of generic parts. Sorry. You did not understand the philosophy of how it all worked together as part of the overall user experience, and that's where most people who use Windows' and other makers' just-good-enough-to-get-by paradigm fail as well. Until they really experience the other superior-by-design-and-intent paradigm, they just don't get it. They think that "good enough" is good enough. Some of us prefer to have a superior experience and are willing to pay for it.

Apple has been using higher-standard hardware for such internals that is similar to all computer hardware for years, except they select the top of the line for everything they put in their equipment, just not the bottom of the barrel, cheapest end, lowest bid, components. For example, the hard drives will be from the certified top 98% quality out put of the supplier.

26 posted on 04/28/2015 2:35:59 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: tacticalogic
Sounds like if he was any more “at peace”, he’d be dead.

We've always thought that Paul Thurrott was kind of mummified.

27 posted on 04/28/2015 2:37:44 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: Swordmaker
We've always thought that Paul Thurrott was kind of mummified.

Okay. Who's "we" ?

28 posted on 04/28/2015 2:45:36 PM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh, bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: tacticalogic
Okay. Who's "we" ?

Most Apple users who are familiar with Thurrott's Apple commentaries. They are usually hilariously wrong like this one. With the exception of the iPad, he has never seen an Apple product that he could find much he liked about it. In the second year of the iPhone, he liked it, but when Microsoft started really pushing Windows Phone, he changed his tune. It was always thought that he was on Microsoft's payroll, and then one day he came out and admitted it. . . he WAS being paid to write for Microsoft. LOL!

Then when he got his own website he named it Paul Thurrott's Windows Supersite. . . still funded by Microsoft.

29 posted on 04/28/2015 3:04:18 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: Swordmaker
Most Apple users who are familiar with Thurrott's Apple commentaries. They are usually hilariously wrong like this one. With the exception of the iPad, he has never seen an Apple product that he could find much he liked about it.

He's wrong because he doesn't like it?

30 posted on 04/28/2015 3:09:16 PM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh, bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: Swordmaker

I wish people had the decency to disclose when they are paid and therefore the conflict of interest they have. He definitely should have disclosed that he’s getting $ from Microsoft, a competitor of Apple.

I wouldn’t be surprised if at least some of the Apple fans that like clockwork chime into every Apple thread are paid by Apple or have some direct or indirect monetary interest in the company. My alarm bells get particularly loud when a bunch of them start talking about the cost of an Apple Watch PER DAY! I have never heard friends mention that about any product, and heard that only from salesmen! LOL! Post #19 does it. Whether he’s a salesman or not, I will never know, but he’s not the only one I’ve seen do that (talk about trying too hard!). I don’t mind anybody talking good or bad about Apple. I just wish that what I hear is either from a real honest to God customer with no financial interest in what they’re saying, or that I know what the conflict is.


31 posted on 04/28/2015 3:33:05 PM PDT by winner3000
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To: winner3000

Once the conflict of interest is disclosed, I wouldn’t dismiss what they have to say, just as I would like the Apple fans to rebut what the author said, even if he is paid by Microsoft. It doesn’t totally make what he said necessarily untrue.


32 posted on 04/28/2015 3:34:27 PM PDT by winner3000
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To: tacticalogic
He's wrong because he doesn't like it?

His predictions, claims, and criticism, just like this article, were far off the mark for accuracy. . . this one is typical.

Thurrott, along with a couple of others, such as Rob Enderle of the Enderle Group, which consists of Rob, his wife, and his dog, as near as anyone can determine, and John C. Dvorak are perpetual jokes in the Apple press circles because of their completely off the mark predictions about Apple products.

33 posted on 04/28/2015 3:39:13 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: Swordmaker
His predictions, claims, and criticism, just like this article, were far off the mark for accuracy. . . this one is typical.

Is there empirical evidence, or is that dogma?

34 posted on 04/28/2015 3:42:03 PM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh, bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: Swordmaker

I was in the Apple store yesterday getting my 5S’s battery replaced, and I played around with their watch.

I was like, “Meh.”

I don’t wear watches, and would have no use for it.


35 posted on 04/28/2015 3:45:13 PM PDT by RandallFlagg ("When you have to shoot, SHOOT! Don't talk." --Tuco)
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To: Swordmaker

They used to make a Star Trek TOS communicator that used bluetooth with your phone to work like the prop did on the show.


36 posted on 04/28/2015 3:48:54 PM PDT by RandallFlagg ("When you have to shoot, SHOOT! Don't talk." --Tuco)
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To: Swordmaker

I am holding out for a death laser app.


37 posted on 04/28/2015 3:56:36 PM PDT by Leep (To put it in laymen's terms liberal/progressive ist coo coo.)
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To: winner3000
I wouldn’t be surprised if at least some of the Apple fans that like clockwork chime into every Apple thread are paid by Apple or have some direct or indirect monetary interest in the company. My alarm bells get particularly loud when a bunch of them start talking about the cost of an Apple Watch PER DAY! I have never heard friends mention that about any product, and heard that only from salesmen! LOL! Post #19 does it. Whether he’s a salesman or not, I will never know, but he’s not the only one I’ve seen do that (talk about trying too hard!). I don’t mind anybody talking good or bad about Apple. I just wish that what I hear is either from a real honest to God customer with no financial interest in what they’re saying, or that I know what the conflict is.

I have stated numerous times that I am not paid by Apple. I own stock in AAPL, but it is not a major holding among my assets. It may be some day, as I liquidate some of my other holdings and move them into AAPL. I enjoy using Apple products. My interest is that I maintain the Apple Ping list. A am an Economist by education with a minor in Business Administration. I would be discussing the cost per day of something like an Apple Watch. It is the way you should look at something you use daily to put it in perspective of your daily expenses. That's why sales people do it.

I am certain that ctdonath2 is not an Apple employee. It is amazing to me how non-Apple users are convinced that Apple users who are enthusiastic about their Apple products must be employed by Apple to tell everyone how much they like them. Because of their mediocre experience with their non-Apple equipment, they simply cannot conceive of someone actually appreciating a excellence in design, function, and usability so much that they really want to share that experience with others in hopes others will find that joy of usability. There simply is nothing wonderful about PC or Android use to share their experiences with others.

38 posted on 04/28/2015 4:15:20 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: tacticalogic
Is there empirical evidence, or is that dogma?

This article critical of an Apple product he admits he hasn't seen or used, but is willing to pan sight unseen is pretty good evidence, I think.

39 posted on 04/28/2015 4:17:23 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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To: RandallFlagg
They used to make a Star Trek TOS communicator that used bluetooth with your phone to work like the prop did on the show.

"They" is a pretty large group. It wasn't Apple. Apple has the largest group of companies making accessories for the iPhone and iPad ecosystem. The Android world has far less, there are just too many phones to try to match.

40 posted on 04/28/2015 4:22:07 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users contnue...)
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