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The Digital Crown paradigm is actually one of the most impressive conceits to reality - fingers on a tiny screen will cover what the heck you're lookin' at. They certainly *could* have stuck with what they had, but I think the solution devised will prove to me the correct one.

No argument there, it is an interesting concept. I can't wait to try it out, but my doubts come from it not necessarily being as intuitive as iOS touch or the iPod click wheel. I think those worked because people are accustomed to pressing buttons and turning dials. How many people regularly interact with a watch crown in modern times? How many people under 20 have ever even used one? Also, every time I have ever used a crown to adjust/wind a watch, I've taken the watch off my wrist because it is more comfortable that way.

I don't know, I think it is just one of those things that the masses have to get their hands on before we find out how effective an interface it is.

The Pebble deals with this with clicky buttons (and completely lacks touch). The DC allows for another implementation of the *result* and *UX* of Pinch/Zoom, without masking the content. Same with scrolling, tho people will be inclined to touch initially.

The Pebble is a little bit of a different animal in that it doesn't try to pack in all the features Apple is, and, their UX is designed solely around the use of 4 buttons without touch and straight forward. it reminds me of the original iPod OS and click wheel. Linear, but easy to use and navigate.

Watch is more like iOS, a complex system with multitasking and multiple input methods. For it to to be approachable you have to have multiple ways to do something to give people room to find their own way, which will encourage them to use the device more and keep the learning curve shallow. If Apple has made the majority of functions operable via Siri, I think that will help a lot.

Wear just...ugh. Maybe by I/O Google will have their ducks aligned so that we devs can really get something out of it.

Well I think it is safe to say that Apple's offering will at least be better than Wear for the time being anyway...

I guess it's been so long now, bu does anyone remember the whole series of videos Apple published teaching people "how to iPhone" because it was all so new?

Perhaps they will do this again for the watch and the UX for the crown and force touch (people will be 'long pressing'...it is velocity/pressure sensitive but people aren't used to that so will be inclines to 'touch and hold')

I'm sure they will, but it really will all come down to how effective of an input device people find the crown to be. Touch was (is) very intuitive for people to learn. I think decades of seeing touchscreen tech in science fiction certainly helped too. It will just take time to see if people embrace the digital crown.

"Heavy is the head that wears the Crown." Well there is certainly a lot riding on this one.
 
I hope the new Apple TV gets unveiled tomorrow but if it runs Apps, then it would make more sense to release it at WWDC with an SDK.
 
The Digital Crown paradigm is actually one of the most impressive conceits to reality - fingers on a tiny screen will cover what the heck you're lookin' at.

LOL, dial as 'paradigm.'

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I don't know what to expect, but I hope it isn't just 60 minutes about a watch.

They won't bore people to death with too much of an already announced product, hopefully they'll b e much more about the MBA's.
 
The prices have potentially been inflated by the media etc so that when the 3 watches go on sale for 349/399, 499/549 and 899/949 people will think they are getting a crazy bargain regardless of which watch they opt for.
 
Jessica Lessin (who used to work for WSJ and now writes for The Information) tweeted:

And FTR, I don't think pricing is going to be the most interesting part of tomorrow's event.
https://twitter.com/Lessien/status/574786037827796993?s=17

And:
@danielpunkass Nah. Maybe just some demos that make you go holy -.
https://twitter.com/Lessien/status/574791381392101376?s=17

Funnily enough, John Gruber replied to her first tweet saying he agreed 100%. I don't know if she has inside information or that's just a guess on her part, but if she's right then I'm quite disappointed that Gruber chose to steer the discussion around pricing.
 
Gruber talks himself right out of his own argument. The strategy in pricing in tiers is to induce up-selling. Considering this reality, a $400 premium for the stainless steel watch with the sport band make no sense. Nobody will in induced to spend that much more just to get steel. More like $100-150 makes a lot more sense. Apple already does this all across their model lines. Why Gruber thinks they will take a radically different approach with Apple Watch is beyond me, and unless I missed some deep thinking, I don't see where he's articulated any argument for it.

Edit: Read Gruber again looking for evidence of deep thinking. None found. His argument for the huge gap between the Sport and Apple Watch models is based on something he calls "operational efficiency." What the hell is that? He doesn't say, but he does say it should be convincing. Sorry, no sale.


I don't know, I'm getting the feeling that he's right and this is being heavily pushed as a fashion accessory first, capabilities second. That's what the run-up from the first announcement till now has suggested. I can't imagine that they're going to do a $349 basic watch, a $499 Steel (polished steel casing, sapphire display, ceramic and sapphire replacing plastic on the back), and a crazy-high price gold watch.

$100 barely covers a 16GB capacity bump with the iPhone in Apple money. That costs them pennies.

A $150 upgrade gets you a stainless steel watch covered in sapphire front to back? Exhibit B, the prices of actual watches. Real designer watches, the caliber Apple is attempting here, are extremely expensive by comparison. They absolutely could charge a grand for the steel watch and get away with it.

We'll have to see.
 
Jessica Lessin (who used to work for WSJ and now writes for The Information) tweeted:



And:


Funnily enough, John Gruber replied to her first tweet saying he agreed 100%. I don't know if she has inside information or that's just a guess on her part, but if she's right then I'm quite disappointed that Gruber chose to steer the discussion around pricing.

If they announce that the internals are upgradable... That would be something no one else is doing and Apple would sell even more than they will already be (because nobody would be worried about V1).

Maybe they got some new sensors to work?

Who knows. People actually got very little about the real function of the watch in september. There could be a lot more coming.
 
it takes way too long to do one simple thing on the watch where you can just easily take your phone out of your pocket.
... only that it isn't always that easy to take your phone out of your pocket. Women tend to carry their phone in their handbag (and regularly overhear a call), the iPhone may be carried in a not-as-easily-reachable inner pocket of your coat, on public transportation it may be too crowded to reach for your iPhone without bumping into your neighbour and in some countries it's even forbidden to touch your phone while driving.

The list is far from being complete and while none of those scenarios may apply to you, sure enough there's a sufficient number of people who could see a benefit from owning a sophisticated remote for their iPhone.

Those will bring enough sales to justify further development of the AppleWatch and over time additional uses and functionality will appear, both from 3rd party and Apple.

Will this first revision be outdated soon? Most probably yes, but the same applied to the first revision of the iPhone itself or the iPad, none of which could be considered a commercial failure at any rate.

Watches like these just aren't ready for primetime.

To be ready for prime time requires to already be on stage when the super trouper lights up!

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I'm getting the feeling that he's right and this is being heavily pushed as a fashion accessory first, capabilities second.
Sharp tongues would argue that this applies to every Apple product for many years now ... :D;)
 
upgradeable

For all those who say that "I would never buy something so expensive that is going to be out of date so fast".

Consider the possibility for Apple to offer upgradeable chips. Given the system is integrated on a single resin-coated chip it would not be a difficult feat. I would not be surprised if this is offered as a set-fee option at the media event.
 

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The prices have potentially been inflated by the media etc so that when the 3 watches go on sale for 349/399, 499/549 and 899/949 people will think they are getting a crazy bargain regardless of which watch they opt for.

All the price speculation is originating from John Gruber. You think Apple fed him bogus prices?
 
For all those who say that "I would never buy something so expensive that is going to be out of date so fast".

Consider the possibility for Apple to offer upgradeable chips. Given the system is integrated on a single resin-coated chip it would not be a difficult feat. I would not be surprised if this is offered as a set-fee option at the media event.

While Apple doesn't let you upgrade freaking 21.5" desktops? You sure are an optimistic guy.
 
I'm not really interested in the Sport. So the difference between the Stainless Steel and the Sport will be a big selling factor for me. I've got a Pebble on my wrist now. Pebbletime is only going to be $199? And the battery lasts a week? It's a tough choice for me.
 
For all those who say that "I would never buy something so expensive that is going to be out of date so fast".

Consider the possibility for Apple to offer upgradeable chips. Given the system is integrated on a single resin-coated chip it would not be a difficult feat. I would not be surprised if this is offered as a set-fee option at the media event.

keep dreaming
 
Maybe. But most Bluetooth headphones are pretty bulky. And I don't see many Bluetooth ear buds. The ones closest to Apple's current design are the Plantronics BackBeat Go 2, and it has a battery life of 4.5 hours. Apple would need to improve on that quite a bit.

I think we still need iPods even with the watch, at least until wireless headphones improve.

Apple currently has two types of wireless ear buds that are very stylish and not bulky at all IMO:
http://store.apple.com/xc/product/MHBE2AM/A
http://store.apple.com/xc/product/MHDM2AM/A (this last one can be seen as bulky but it is the exact same size as its weird counterpart)
 
While Apple doesn't let you upgrade freaking 21.5" desktops? You sure are an optimistic guy.
The iMac can be easily used for a couple of years and with its (in comparison) multitude of ports the usable lifespan can be prolongued even further. So in theory the case is different with the Applewatch.

But unfortunately I have to agree with you - it's highly unlikely given Apple's track record ...
 
I don't know, I'm getting the feeling that he's right and this is being heavily pushed as a fashion accessory first, capabilities second. That's what the run-up from the first announcement till now has suggested. I can't imagine that they're going to do a $349 basic watch, a $499 Steel (polished steel casing, sapphire display, ceramic and sapphire replacing plastic on the back), and a crazy-high price gold watch.

$100 barely covers a 16GB capacity bump with the iPhone in Apple money. That costs them pennies.

A $150 upgrade gets you a stainless steel watch covered in sapphire front to back? Exhibit B, the prices of actual watches. Real designer watches, the caliber Apple is attempting here, are extremely expensive by comparison. They absolutely could charge a grand for the steel watch and get away with it.

We'll have to see.

I don't think so. I think the fashion focus so far is more to do with Apple wanting to keep everything else as secret as possible for today's event. Since people have already seen the device they can show it off in ads but I suspect after today functionality will get equal billing to fashion. And I bet any TV ads Apple does will be all about functionality.
 
Where did you see that? The article says "midyear". WWDC is midyear. MBP 15" is a pro machine. WWDC is a pro event. Tada!

Skylake. Late 2015/early 2016 release.

Tada!

(What's the point of having a Broadwell rMBP with no redesign, when you can get a redesigned rMBP with Skylake? Better cooling=support for better graphics card like the 970M nVidia Maxwell card.

If there is a Broadwell rMBP mid 2015, it's going to be a dud upgrade–a stopgap between the terrible 2014 upgrade, and the 2016 redesign.)

I would actually cry.:mad:. jk jk, just extremely angry.

:mad:
 
For all those who say that "I would never buy something so expensive that is going to be out of date so fast".

Consider the possibility for Apple to offer upgradeable chips. Given the system is integrated on a single resin-coated chip it would not be a difficult feat. I would not be surprised if this is offered as a set-fee option at the media event.

So every year millions of people line up at the Apple Store to get their watch upgraded. Apple would have to hire a small country (which they can at the moment) just for the yearly upgrades. I hope you're right though, but I doubt anyone but the Edition buyers will get that kind of service.
 
..."garbage" before we use that label, no? Is there a particular recent product you had in mind to apply this to? I've bought pretty much everything out of Apple in the last few years and can't think of a single product that fits that moniker, but we may buy different things...

-K

Products aren't just hardware. Products come as software and services too, you know. You're the typical consumer who thinks of a "product" as just what you go to the store and pay with your credit card for.

Apple has released botched versions of iOS, botched versions of Yosemite... horrid AppleTV connectivity updates. The hardware has been ok... in fact they really haven't released much new lately aside from iPhone 6\6+, but even those were not without issue. I bought 9 (big share plan with family\friends), and of the 9, 5 had issues (dead pixels, separation between the casing and the screen, crack at the bottom, general QC issues at a higher rate than previous gen phones).

Maybe "garbage" is a bit of an dramatization, but compared to issues in the past, I'm definitely seeing more, considering the slower pace which Apple is releasing hardware refreshes of late. How's that Thunderbolt display from 2011? And the AppleTV from 3 years ago. The router from 2.5 years ago. What other electronics manufacturers have that sort of release timeframes? It's starting to feel like Apple is losing track of what their core products are.... and the old Apple would always say if it's not going to be done right, it's not going to be done at all... and that includes software and updating the products.

But oh well, you're clearly on a mission to defend apple. Why aren't you defending iOS 8.0.1? Oh you were probably at work the half a day when 20,000 users downloaded the release and couldn't use their phones. Where were you 2 months ago when those who first updated to OS 10.10.2 couldn't use continuity or iMessage services for almost a month? Garbage seems to describe both those issues to me QUITE well.
 
I thought this event was going to be on a Tuesday. Now something to look forward to today!
 
It's cause we cant just click a down arrow - insteads they make us fight.

I'm all for hearing out people that disagree... but many times it's people who don't understand technology... and the problem is often those people don't want to learn, they just want to be told what to do. When something happens to my mom's iPhone, she calls and says to fix it (to me). I try to explain what's happening so she understands what her phone is doing and what caused it to do it, she doesn't care. She just wants it fixed. It frustrates me because next time it happens she'll call again, whereas if she listened to what I do to help, she'd be able to solve the issue herself. I guess it's more of a problem with the mindset shift in America, always wanting to push issues off onto someone else. Very disturbing trend.

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The reality is that iOS and Mac OS X are about 90% parity under-the-hood, so it really has never been about putting "full OS X" on iPads.

This isn't really a *new* thing either...the number has climbed but when I was originally hacking the iPhone before the full SDK was released, I was amazed at how much "Mac OS X" is in there.

So I guess the better question/position is "what do you want on 'iOS' that is on 'Mac OS X' that Apple isn't giving you?"...because if defined that way, it is very probably coming sooner than you think.

-K

I want to run OS X on my iPad. If you need a dissertation as to what iOS can't do that OS X can do, there are plenty of those on the internet.
 
For all those who say that "I would never buy something so expensive that is going to be out of date so fast".

Consider the possibility for Apple to offer upgradeable chips. Given the system is integrated on a single resin-coated chip it would not be a difficult feat. I would not be surprised if this is offered as a set-fee option at the media event.

Given Apple was moved away from allowing users to upgrade/service its laptop and desktop lines, it would be a radical turnaround for them to allow upgrades of a tiny watch.

They would prefer you buy a new watch every few years ;)
 
While Apple doesn't let you upgrade freaking 21.5" desktops? You sure are an optimistic guy.

Well, if they could have a 50% markeup on say a $150 S1 upgrade per year, instead of people upgrading their watch every 4 years, they'd surely do it..

$350*1/4 = $85*0.6= $51 profit / year VS $100 profit per upgrade. Doesn't seem like a bad deal.

Obviously, they wouldn't want to support internal connectors internally. But, they could support support them for 5 years for sure.

The advantage of that people would also have a tendency to go for much more expensive casings, with Apple probably also having a higher margins on those too.

Seems pretty logical to me. Doesn't mean they'll do it though. I don't know the engineering and logistics of doing so.

They surely don't want 5 year upgrade cycles like the Ipad.
Getting money continuously would be different and original.
 
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Given Apple was moved away from allowing users to upgrade/service its laptop and desktop lines, it would be a radical turnaround for them to allow upgrades of a tiny watch.

They would prefer you buy a new watch every few years ;)

Apple is all about margins. If this would provide the highest margins (it could); they may do it.

If they could build Mac Mini that allow a pluggable sealed circuit board (looking like a cartridge) to be swapped each year by users for half the price of the new device (thus greatly shortening upgrade cycles), they would.

Say a device X is replace every 5 years.
Either you get P * 20% * 0.4 = P*8% profit per year
or you get say
P/2 * 0.50 (profit margin) = P*25% each mid cycle upgrade
Even if they took this upgrade once every 3 years, you'd still be slightly ahead.
 
If Gruber is right again then Apple Watch is seriously overpriced for what it really is. Apple Watch has nothing other smart watches can't do other than ran out of battery way sooner than new Pebble. After few revisions we'll be seeing a watch with much better autonomy. When Apple hits 7 days of autonomy I'm buying.
 
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