Moto 360 review

We're letting a poor product slide because it is groundbreaking. The Moto 360 has pushed the whole Smartwatch world forward by it simply existing, we now have circular watches which are barely bigger than a traditional clockwork watch, that's a big freaking deal (running Android with an LCD screen no less).

Will I buy the Moto 360? No. The battery issues are not something I am willing to put up with, and frankly I think eInk is a better watch technology than LCD displays for that reason. But I cannot ignore how big this product is. It is HUGE, it is the iPhone of the Smartwatch world.

Ah, a troll. Nice to meet you.

In case you aren't a troll (in which case I'm sorry, my mistake) and are just ignorant let me remind you about tablets before the iPad. They were big, bulky, plastic. Ran Windows (not touch optimised). Required a stylus. There was little to no custom software for them. They were expensive. And nobody bought them because they sucked. Then the iPad came along - good software, good hardware, affordable price.

Smart watches seem the same to me so far. For something you wear - a fashion accessory - they all look terrible. Even the Moto 360 (which is by far the best looking) doesn't look great. Apart from the Moto 360 all of them have managed to have horrible watch face designs. Moto are the only ones that look decent. The functionality is ok but not great. Not $250 great. Not enough to make me want to strap something ugly to my body.

Apple could screw up and produce a piece of crap nobody wants. But my guess is that they will come out with something vastly better and every single smart watch manufacturer will have copied them within 6-12 months.

I feel the same way, but I'll probably buy the 360 anyway. Still debating it with myself. Oddly enough my main issue is the size. I don't want to broadcast, "Look at this nerd" by wearing a huge bulky screen on my wrist. I figure Google is really on Wear 1.0 and the next update is going to address a lot of concerns, especially in regards to battery life. This is still early adopter territory.

My concern is that Apple has the ecosystem to do something dramatic that Androidland simply can't catch up to quickly. I know Apple has been down on the Qi charger system, but they never really talk about wireless charging. In my mind wireless charging and wearables go hand-in-hand. Imagine if your next phone had witricity built-in. It would charge your wearables all day. The battery on your wearable would need to be just big enough to handle occasional disconnects from your phone. Now you've solved the battery problem. Sure, your phone will discharge faster but Apple can add a slightly fatter battery to make up for it.

Meanwhile, the Android guys are all trying to figure out how the heck to build things with strong enough batteries.

Just speculation, but I'm afraid that someone with a clever enough gamechanger is going to rule smartwatches. The first iphone's ultra-smooth OS and touch-screen only really made my Treo look like crap. I'm expecting something on this level here. My best guess is that the Apple device will be ultra simplistic like the Pebble with similar battery life while the Android guys are stuck with Google's wearable vision of yet another smartphone-like device on your wrist. The latter might just not be feasible at this generation of technology. It also doesn't help that Motorola chose an older SoC at a process that will use more energy than the latest SoC's.

My gut feeling is that this thing is like buying the G1. Lots of promise, but you're better off waiting until the next attempt.