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Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

seattletimes.com

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Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#21

Post by danso »

mikestew wrote: post #2

Alternate headline: “Potentially Life-saving Tech Works as Advertised”. I know, I know, it’s a human interest story and the regular folks might not know this. But my first thought reading the headline was, “it better call, or I’m going to be puzzling how to get a refund in the afterlife.”

Does Apple marketing guarantee that it will work? I bought watches for my parents, partly because of the feature, but I never had the impression that it was guaranteed to correctly detect all (or even most) life threatening situations

Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#22

Post by selimthegrim »

function_seven wrote: post #19
rolltiide wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to read your cousin died this way. I don't understand. The Apple Watch told him his heart isn't working right - automatically calling emergency services - and he also called his wife to let him know the watch says there is an emergency with his heart? Or was it that he too passed out, the Apple Watch called emergency services, who resuscitated him enabling him to call his wife?

I think the watch detected his fall (which was a result of the heart attack)

Correct. I had heard speculation he may have noticed ECG stuff but he was still conscious enough to call his wife.

Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#24

Post by ogre_codes »

amiantos wrote: post #16
bt848 wrote: post #14

Apple marketing machine in action: get local press to write up as a novelty feature that main competitor has had for ages.

Please name this competitor that had fall detection ('for ages') that automatically messages emergency services for you?

There are none (but you know this).

Samsung is going to implement it "Sometime early next year" in their currently shipping version.

Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#27

Post by xpe »

swayvil wrote: post #8

My friend was digging a hole in her garden. Her watch asked her, "are you ok?".

An Apple Watch? How deep was the hole?

(Tangent: anyhow, this reminds me of a great aphorism:

> If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

This can apply to many situations involving technical debt in software... is it really more effective to do many unseemly hacks rather just fix it properly?)

Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#29

Post by Izkata »

FireBeyond wrote: post #25

Life Alert, horrendous as their ads may be, would probably be surprised to hear that it's only now that you're finding a "device which can contact emergency services in the event of an accident" so life changing. As might OnStar, etc.

Not really. All those other services require the person to hit a button to trigger it, which they can't do while unconscious. The Apple watch called automatically on its own.

Re: Bike crash left Spokane man unconscious, so his Apple Watch called 911

#30

Post by wtracy »

FireBeyond wrote: post #25

Life Alert, horrendous as their ads may be, would probably be surprised to hear that it's only now that you're finding a "device which can contact emergency services in the event of an accident" so life changing. As might OnStar, etc.

All of those services rely on manual intervention from staff in a call center.

If any of those services have reached the point that the end device can detect an emergency and contact local emergency services by itself, then they've done a terrible job of advertising that functionality.

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