iWatch? MagicBand? Coincidence? I think not...

[JBravo1977]

Just something I thought was quite funny...

Both Apple and Disney suddenly have an interest in attaching technology to people's wrists!

The Knight Foundation had this technology 30 years ago.

"KITT, come get me, buddy!"




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[AEfx]

A phone that falls out of my pocket in a show in spite of my paranoia about it doing just that and then trying to convince a cast member it's mine by calling it from my wife's phone. Of course that doesn't work because cell service is so bad in the parks that it doesn't ring. Though I was lucky to have her phone since it fell out of her pocket a day earlier on the monorail and a cast member found it.... maybe I need to find some technology that I can wear instead. Never dropped or lost my watch.

Or maybe you guys just need to find clothing with more secure pockets?

I've carried a cell for about 15 years, probably owned 6 or 7 different devices, and it's never just "fallen" out of my pocket. I've dropped my phone a few times out of my hand, but never just had one fall off.

And, as someone above said, there are various cases/devices you can use to mitigate this as well if it's a big problem for you.

Thing is, you still are going to need your phone. An iWatch, should it happen, will be an accessory not a product on it's own, when it comes to communication. You aren't going to be able to walk around with one and make phone calls on it unless your phone is on your person, anyway, and connected with Bluetooth. And if you want to make a call you will likely have to have a bluetooth or wired headset anyway, or you will be using a speaker in your wrist and everyone in the world will hear every convo you had. Cripes on a device that size I can just hear the worst "Can you hear me now?" 'cell phone voice' annoyances ever.

Apple works very hard to get all the parts small enough for an iPhone and cram them into the space possible - no way it's that small and does much of anything but provide a secondary display for your phone. So you can basically read short texts, etc. - but it's not like you will be able to interact very much with it (touch screen that size wouldn't even allow the smallest bit of text entry unless you used a stylus, and even then would be ridiculous). And I won't even get into the part about having a true wireless antenna, or, worse, a cell antenna (though, again, that won't happen - it will simply use the one in your phone) attached to your wrist all day everyday - nothing like strapping a device that is highly suspected to give you cancer strapped skin-tight to a major artery. At least the Disney devices use NFC which is relatively passive.

So the most it will save you is that you can have your phone in your bag and not have to take it out to read a text, but any communication out or looking something up, etc. - you still are going to have to dig out your phone. Undoubtedly it would allow access to Siri if your phone supports it (Siri takes a lot of juice and horsepower, only the two newer model iPhones even have it) but again, connected to your phone - and despite what the commercials show you, it doesn't work great - and you still are talking out loud to your wrist, unless you have yet another headset device.

People have been saying wearables are the "next big thing" for many years now, but the truth is - unless you are going the Google route, no one really wants to wear anything with a big enough display to be truly useful - sure, those who get those Bluetooth Nike shoes for running that hook up to your phone will love this, and a few people in certain industries that need immediate notifications sent to them (medical, etc.) but as a consumer device wearables are novelty and toys. All this talk about it being the future is like in the 50's and 60's where we imagined everyone would be flying around in floating cars - there really is just no need or demand outside of a small subset of people who simply like (very expensive) gadgets.