IBM Watson Trend pegs Apple Watch as hottest holiday gift

Posted:
in Apple Watch edited November 2015
IBM on Wednesday launched a new app and service called Watson Trend, which forecasts what consumer products will be popular this holiday season based on online chatter. Currently dominating the list: the Apple Watch.




IBM Watson Trend is a free download from the iOS App Store, designed for both iPhone and iPad. It uses IBM's supercomputer technology to read and interpret millions of reviews, expert blogs and social media conversations to determine what gifts people are talking about.

By far the most popular device on the list is the Apple Watch, which has maintained a "trend score" above 90 (out of 100) since mid-August. With a perfect score of 100 as of Wednesday, the Apple Watch has a score nearly double that of the next closest product: Samsung TVs.

Of course, the Watson algorithm simply says that users are talking about the Apple Watch, not necessarily buying it. Apple's actual hottest selling product is the iPhone lineup, which observers expect to sell nearly 80 million units in this quarter alone.

Apple hasn't disclosed actual sales figures for the Apple Watch, and has no plans to do so, citing competitive reasons. Still, data and commentary from the company reveal that the Apple Watch outperformed the initial launches of the iPhone in 2007 and the iPad in 2010, with total sales of at least $1.7 billion in the first five months.

IBM's Watson Trend notes that discussion about the Apple Watch has been "mostly very positive, with few detractors." In particular, it said that the debut of watchOS 2.0 in September addressed many early adopter concerns with the device.

In terms of negatives, the main concern among users discussing the Apple Watch is battery life. In its current state, the Apple Watch must be recharged nightly, with an advertised uptime of 18 hours.

"Many people are also expecting an Apple Watch 2 to hit the shelves by the Summer of 2016 and are waiting on the sidelines until all the 'bugs' are worked out of version 1," IBM said.





IBM Watson Trend scours 10,000 sources, including social media sites, blogs, forums, comments, ratings and reviews. Rather than just ranking discussion, Watson also uses its natural language processing capabilities to determine how consumers feel about products they are considering or have purchased.

Other trends revealed by Watson include demand for professional-grade cameras, "Star Wars" and Lego toys, and the "Minecraft" wearable Gameband.

IBM has also predicted that this year, for the first time ever, more consumers will turn to their mobile devices than a traditional PC to conduct their holiday shopping.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 40
    levilevi Posts: 344member
    Not at all surprised, but glad to see some signs of validation. Regarding the Watson app, glad to see IBM developing some consumer side applications using this tech. Last year some articles were written about the potential of built in Apple search engine powered by Watson. Still hopefully something like this is in the works.
  • Reply 2 of 40
    levilevi Posts: 344member
    sog35 wrote: »
    But, but, but the Watch is a failure..
    But, but, but Steve Jobs would never release a Watch.....
    but, but, but, but.......

    In your FACE AppleWatch haters.

    you will be proven WRONG again.  The Apple Watch will be the fastest selling Apple product EVER in its first year of release.  It will blow away the records by iPhone, iPod, and iPad.

    The funny thing is the haters are already moving off of Apple Watch and their new target is the iPad Pro.

    And our shares are finally getting a bump today :-)
  • Reply 3 of 40
    brucemcbrucemc Posts: 1,541member

    That can't be!  Almost every media/tech/financial blogger and news site, together with majority of pundits, have already classified this product as a failure!  Not to mention millions of internet forum posters.



    Clearly this app is also a failure!

    /s

  • Reply 4 of 40
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    But I thought ?Watch was a failure because everyone wants round and square is for nerds?
  • Reply 5 of 40

    I speak from experience that the battery life is at least 18 hours. If I exercise, then battery life is around 30% when I go to sleep (sleep 7-8 hours). And it's 100% when I wake up at night 4-5 hours of going to sleep (I drink a large glass of water before bed to help with DVT) - I put it on then so it can track my sleeping heart rate.

  • Reply 6 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Levi View Post



    And our shares are finally getting a bump today :-)

     

    You can thank Goldman Sachs' moment of clarity regarding Apple for that, though they're probably just looking to dump shares before the Fed raises rates and the whole market tanks later today. :)

  • Reply 7 of 40
    fastasleep wrote: »
    You can thank Goldman Sachs' moment of clarity regarding Apple for that, though they're probably just looking to dump shares before the Fed raises rates and the whole market tanks later today. :)

    Ah... There is that to look forward to... /s
  • Reply 8 of 40
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    fastasleep wrote: »
    You can thank Goldman Sachs' moment of clarity regarding Apple for that, though they're probably just looking to dump shares before the Fed raises rates and the whole market tanks later today. :)
    I think the entire segment is up today, tho Apple is doing better than most.
  • Reply 9 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Levi View Post





    And our shares are finally getting a bump today :-)

    Thanks to Goldman Sachs, not IBM though :-)

  • Reply 10 of 40
    That certainly follows my anecdotal evidence.
  • Reply 11 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by brucemc View Post



    Clearly this app is also a failure!

    /s




    Aim higher - Watson is a failure!

  • Reply 12 of 40
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    But, but, but the Watch is a failure..

    But, but, but Steve Jobs would never release a Watch.....

    but, but, but, but.......

     

    In your FACE AppleWatch haters.

     

    you will be proven WRONG again.  The Apple Watch will be the fastest selling Apple product EVER in its first year of release.  It will blow away the records by iPhone, iPod, and iPad.

     

    The funny thing is the haters are already moving off of Apple Watch and their new target is the iPad Pro.


     

     

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by brucemc View Post

     

    That can't be!  Almost every media/tech/financial blogger and news site, together with majority of pundits, have already classified this product as a failure!  Not to mention millions of internet forum posters.



    Clearly this app is also a failure!

    /s




    You would think these naysayers would be embarrassed by being wrong all the time but no, they go right on predicting Apple Doom™. As sog35 points out they move from one product to the next. Apple Music, Apple TV, iPad Pro have all been declared Epic Fails by this group. They often invoke Steve Jobs’ name and lament how far Apple has ‘fallen’ since his death. Of course they want Eddie Cue and Tim Cook out for some twisted reason.

  • Reply 13 of 40

    The haters went off of the watch to the Apple TV then to the iPad pro.

  • Reply 14 of 40
    "How much did Apple pay Watson to say that?" /s
  • Reply 15 of 40
    Maybe Siri and Watson are dating? If they could get married they could give birth to the greatest Search Engine of all time, far surpassing anything Google has or could generate. This would also blow open the ability to monetize iADS or search advertising. Maybe Apple and IBM could share the advertising revenues?
  • Reply 16 of 40
    quinneyquinney Posts: 2,528member
    "How much did Apple pay Watson to say that?" /s

    Quid pro quo for all those Apple products IBM is buying.:p
  • Reply 17 of 40
    The Apple Watch is definetly on my holiday shopping list. With the $50 discount or $100 gift card deals being offered by Best Buy & Target it's a great time to buy one. I will be getting my wife the rose gold sport with lavender band. My brothers and I will also be splitting the cost of a gold sport with navy band for my mother.

    On a side note, both my mom and wife are nurses and use there watches for timing things quite often. Any nurses or medical professionals here that could tell me their experiances with using them at work? Thanks.
  • Reply 18 of 40
    supadav03 wrote: »
    The Apple Watch is definetly on my holiday shopping list. With the $50 discount or $100 gift card deals being offered by Best Buy & Target it's a great time to buy one. I will be getting my wife the rose gold sport with lavender band. My brothers and I will also be splitting the cost of a gold sport with navy band for my mother.

    On a side note, both my mom and wife are nurses and use there watches for timing things quite often. Any nurses or medical professionals here that could tell me their experiances with using them at work? Thanks.

    At $400-$500 it is a non-starter for me, but take $100 off and I start to get interested. I think the sweet spot is for monster sales is probably around $250 (for the big one with the better battery).

    Sog35, maybe declare victory after sales and not when we hear guesses from an AI based on web traffic. My guess is the take-rate is about what was predicted- 6%.
  • Reply 19 of 40
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by LarryA View Post



    At $400-$500 it is a non-starter for me, but take $100 off and I start to get interested. I think the sweet spot is for monster sales is probably around $250 (for the big one with the better battery).



    Sog35, maybe declare victory after sales and not when we hear guesses from an AI based on web traffic. My guess is the take-rate is about what was predicted- 6%.

     


    It's $299 for the 38mm Sport right now at Best Buy ($50 off MSRP) and $349 for the 38mm Sport at Target with $100 gift card. Thats pretty accessible.
  • Reply 20 of 40
    bigpicsbigpics Posts: 1,397member

    This has become a thread about the watch and its doomsayers rather than about this interesting (and potentially double-edged) application of the powerful and portentious Watson AI technology.



    But I will just point out that this app (if it becomes popular and influential in its own right) has the potential to warp in on itself, creating self-reinforcing feedback loops where things become more (or less) popular because the app is letting its devoted users know those things are becoming more or less popular.....



    ....and what are the implications of a digital snake eating its own tail...???



    At least I (if only me) find this a Q worth pondering....

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