Apple’s special September event ended with a short concert, and that’s pretty much the same like last year’s iPhone 5s event as well. This year, everyone around me have been expecting something great from Apple especially in the smart wearables sector, it has so many rumored leaks, from a fitness band like form factor to an iOS inspired interface squarish watch design, which simply makes everyone hope that Apple’s smartwatch is going to be something that will once again revolutionize the smartwatch industry, but what we have for yesterday is this:
Calling it the Apple Watch is a pretty straightforward name, it’s Apple’s own watch after all, and yet people are calling it the iWatch. First of all, I like the Apple Watch design, it doesn’t look cheaply made at all and has delivered some of the most impressive materials onboard which not many of its competition can do so, the hardware itself is certainly precisely made and the company has certainly paid enough attention to the details. The Apple Watch will have everything it needs to be a smartwatch – it has a fitness tracker, runs third party apps, receives notifications and – probably integrating one of the most interesting feature on it – Apple Pay, that lets you make payments using the built-in NFC.
Should I be excited? Yes I should be, but I really don’t know how to cheer for it (apart from the fact that I was pissed off by the stupid live stream source), the Apple Watch simply doesn’t solve the woes of a smartwatch, and here are the Top 5 reasons:
It doesn’t operate standalone
I owned the second generation Sony SmartWatch and during that time, I thought it was one of the best smartwatch that I’ve ever owned, it needs to pair to the phone via Bluetooth in order to work and access most of its features, but after some time, I got fed up returned to my faithful and beautiful rounded TITUS watch. Here’s the thing, a watch will always be a watch, it shows you the time, buzzes when it has an alarm set, needs to be water resistant, and at least have a stopwatch feature, what’s the point if your smartphone battery is dead and these features just can’t be accessed?
As a tech journalist, I keep switching my phones and when that happens, I want a smartwatch that can function normally as a watch with some built-in simple and smart apps to go along, because some devices might not be compatible with the smartwatch that I’m wearing. Not only just that, I’ll also need the smartwatch to be able to standalone and track my calories when I’m doing workouts, because I’m so not going to have a phone shaking in my pockets while I run on a treadmill. Having a smartwatch paired to a phone is relatively important and necessary, but if the Apple Watch relies on the iPhone to get most of its features accessed and work, it really feels stupid to wear one when your phone is out of battery.
It doesn’t support cross platform
We all know this is going to happen, the Apple Watch is only supported on iPhones, Apple expects you the user to buy an Apple device every year and continue using the Apple Watch, while this makes sense for Apple, it doesn’t for a user like me. A perfect smartwatch is something that can simply pair to any smartphone operating system with the necessary companion app. You can argue that there are apps on the Apple Watch that requires an iPhone to work, but why should that matter? Let’s get back to the basics of a normal watch, when you buy one, you are probably going to wear it for years until it spoils; put that thought back onto a smartwatch, you will want it to be able to last you through a few devices that you change, given that the current trend is that we tend to switch our smartphones faster than a watch, it is necessary that any company produce a smartwatch that can support other platforms.
Till then, Pebble is the only smartwatch that supports the two most popular smartphone operating system – Android and iOS, whereas the Apple Watch doesn’t.
Battery life is still a problem
I owned a Pebble Steel and have reviewed a Samsung Gear 2, both have great battery life that will be able to last me a week before needing a charge, despite being great, it just isn’t satisfying enough and have a battery life like a real watch. In Apple’s keynote, the Apple Watch is expected to have an all-day battery life, so we are going to assume that the watch is going to last you for a day or two before it needs a charge. While we still can’t proof that the watch’s battery life is bad, Apple can’t simply make a revolutionary battery life out of its first watch. The company’s iPad has a solid 10 hour battery life for every models, the MacBooks get battery improvement with every hardware refresh, but why can’t they make a smartwatch with an amazing battery life? I can do with a month battery life or just give me solar charging so I won’t need to charge the watch again.
The Apple Watch isn’t perfect and it’s Apple’s first attempt at launching a new product category without Steve Jobs onboard, though I have to applaud them for crafting a product that’s beautiful and expensive materials with the finest touch to detail, the user interface is probably the most beautiful and intuitive one on a smartwatch. Sadly, it isn’t revolutionary or magical at all and it isn’t going to change the smart wearables industry like what the original iPhone did back in 2007. For such an immature product category, I would rather have Apple stay put and not even mention about the watch, because by releasing the smartwatch, it actually shows that Apple have been stressed out by competition out there, if you are going to create a revolutionary product, you simply have to see what your competitors have up on their sleeves.
As Steve Jobs have quoted Picasso – good artists copy, great artists steal, so Apple, you are a pretty bad artist out there now and lastly, I can buy another smartphone at the price of $349.We miss you, Steve.
