It might not ever "fit in" for your life and your interests, but believe the potential for a useful device is great. For me it depends on how many different things are monitored, but the ability to collect, monitor and correlate body functions in realtime will be a game changer. The exact timing may be fuzzy, but I presume the iWatch will be a reality. Heart rate, temp, blood pressure monitoring can be useful, but monitoring of things like glucose levels will be intriguing. Whether the technology issues are solved this go-around, at some point I see it as a just a matter of time before we have our own "medical lab" connected to our body.
Many saw the potential immediately at the time of the iPhone announcement, but for others they needed to see the iPhone in action before seeing how it would impact their lives. I expect the same will be true for these devices. Once you have the potential for 24/7 monitoring available it opens up the world for apps in personalized nutrition, identifying allergy issues, elder care, accident alert, diabetes detection and management... It will be interesting to see how this evolves, as I'm sure more applications will be envisioned once people start correlating the data. I'm sure my vision of the potential is limited - the next decade should be interesting.
I totally agree that the next decade will be very interesting. And I think you're correct that there is great potential for a useful device. But does that make it the kind of device consumers find necessary? Useful and necessary are two different things. The potential medical applications are great. That said, I find the potential to track and analyze personal biometric data to be almost a bit narcissistic - unless there's a legitimate medical reason. I don't know, I just don't see the need or appeal. Nor do I want to receive notifications on my wrist. When I want to navigate, I want the bigger screen of the phone I'm carrying anyway. Etc.
I'm completely open to being surprised by the iWatch and I might decide to start wearing a watch again after 10+ years of not wearing one. But if analyzing personal biometric data is the big selling point, count me as totally not interested. And I personally don't think it will resonate with most consumers.
Gaming, on the other hand, is a sure thing. A game store to rent/buy games. An App Store for television would revolutionize the way we consume media. Apple doesn't need to reinvent television. They just need to put an App Store on Apple TV and let the market do the rest. Beef up the hardware enough to satisfy demanding, not obsessive, gamers. Keep the price under $200. It would be huge. Way bigger than the iWatch.
I totally agree that the next decade will be very interesting. And I think you're correct that there is great potential for a useful device. But does that make it the kind of device consumers find necessary? Useful and necessary are two different things. The potential medical applications are great. That said, I find the potential to track and analyze personal biometric data to be almost a bit narcissistic - unless there's a legitimate medical reason. I don't know, I just don't see the need or appeal. Nor do I want to receive notifications on my wrist. When I want to navigate, I want the bigger screen of the phone I'm carrying anyway. Etc.
I'm completely open to being surprised by the iWatch and I might decide to start wearing a watch again after 10+ years of not wearing one. But if analyzing personal biometric data is the big selling point, count me as totally not interested. And I personally don't think it will resonate with most consumers.
Gaming, on the other hand, is a sure thing. A game store to rent/buy games. An App Store for television would revolutionize the way we consume media. Apple doesn't need to reinvent television. They just need to put an App Store on Apple TV and let the market do the rest. Beef up the hardware enough to satisfy demanding, not obsessive, gamers. Keep the price under $200. It would be huge. Way bigger than the iWatch.
I sense we're more likely on the same page regarding the general viewpoint of product appeal, but may place a different personal value on the iWatch functionality. Which is ok, as this makes the world go around.
I expect Apple will continue to develop on many fronts, and agree gaming has great potential. I don't see them as mutually exclusive, nor see one having to have a larger potential market than the other to be viable.
As I said, there would be enough value in monitoring the body, but can understand this wouldn't be compelling for many. One of the important questions, in my mind, is whether Apple will develop a platform with enough functionality to spur 3rd party developers interest and imagination. If they perform as they have in the past, it will be robust and will be another "connection point" between their other products and services.
You mentioned you didn't see analyzing personal biometric data resonating with most consumers - this could easily be true, but I don't think any individual functionality Apple included in an iWatch needs to captivate the masses. Attracting a few percent of the population to the medical functionality, a few percent for sports training, a few percent for home automation, etc can provide an overall large demand.
I've read there are over 350 million diabetics in the world, and many are looking for better solutions for management - estimates are that a good portion who are diabetic don't know they have a problem. I don't know if the numbers are accurate, but have no problem believing they are high enough to be worth addressing.
Even notification which has limited appeal to me, could be of interest to those who keep their phones tucked away in places like purses - where many a phone call goes unnoticed as the purse muffle the ringing phone.
It looks like Apple is setting up some interesting things with geofencing, beacons and home automation and wouldn't be surprised If the smart watch is one of the ways to have the house adjust to our presence - this appeals to me as I don't want to have to carry a cell phone around to make this work.
It will be interesting to see how this all unfolds...
Comments
I totally agree that the next decade will be very interesting. And I think you're correct that there is great potential for a useful device. But does that make it the kind of device consumers find necessary? Useful and necessary are two different things. The potential medical applications are great. That said, I find the potential to track and analyze personal biometric data to be almost a bit narcissistic - unless there's a legitimate medical reason. I don't know, I just don't see the need or appeal. Nor do I want to receive notifications on my wrist. When I want to navigate, I want the bigger screen of the phone I'm carrying anyway. Etc.
I'm completely open to being surprised by the iWatch and I might decide to start wearing a watch again after 10+ years of not wearing one. But if analyzing personal biometric data is the big selling point, count me as totally not interested. And I personally don't think it will resonate with most consumers.
Gaming, on the other hand, is a sure thing. A game store to rent/buy games. An App Store for television would revolutionize the way we consume media. Apple doesn't need to reinvent television. They just need to put an App Store on Apple TV and let the market do the rest. Beef up the hardware enough to satisfy demanding, not obsessive, gamers. Keep the price under $200. It would be huge. Way bigger than the iWatch.
Bet you said the something about the iPod when it entered a market filled with
competitors.
I expect Apple will continue to develop on many fronts, and agree gaming has great potential. I don't see them as mutually exclusive, nor see one having to have a larger potential market than the other to be viable.
As I said, there would be enough value in monitoring the body, but can understand this wouldn't be compelling for many. One of the important questions, in my mind, is whether Apple will develop a platform with enough functionality to spur 3rd party developers interest and imagination. If they perform as they have in the past, it will be robust and will be another "connection point" between their other products and services.
You mentioned you didn't see analyzing personal biometric data resonating with most consumers - this could easily be true, but I don't think any individual functionality Apple included in an iWatch needs to captivate the masses. Attracting a few percent of the population to the medical functionality, a few percent for sports training, a few percent for home automation, etc can provide an overall large demand.
I've read there are over 350 million diabetics in the world, and many are looking for better solutions for management - estimates are that a good portion who are diabetic don't know they have a problem. I don't know if the numbers are accurate, but have no problem believing they are high enough to be worth addressing.
Even notification which has limited appeal to me, could be of interest to those who keep their phones tucked away in places like purses - where many a phone call goes unnoticed as the purse muffle the ringing phone.
It looks like Apple is setting up some interesting things with geofencing, beacons and home automation and wouldn't be surprised If the smart watch is one of the ways to have the house adjust to our presence - this appeals to me as I don't want to have to carry a cell phone around to make this work.
It will be interesting to see how this all unfolds...
Hey Meg, get that parachute ready . Your time is up in 10-9-8...
It'll be a golden parachute. She has nothing to worry about!