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Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

news.ycombinator.com

61–70 of 76 posts

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#61
post #55

I am happy that the days of needing a watch are behind me. I think the primary annoyance centered around the fact that I'm left-handed. Since I'm left-handed, I only really have the coordination to strap a watch using my left hand, meaning the watch itself is on the right hand.... this interferes with using a mouse with my right hand! The watch would get caught on the edge of my desk. Maybe the fact that I'm a lefty…

lefty that uses a mouse with my right hand

Same here, so not that weird.

I have actual reasons for this, which are (1) using a shared computer (as a kid, and later the computer labs at university), having to rearrange things got annoying after a while; (2) the nicer mice tend to be "ergonomic" in ways that don't work when used left-handed; (3) when I used to play computer games more, all the keyboard shortcuts assumed the keyboard was to the left.

Edit: And now that I think about it, the standard cut/copy/paste/save shortcuts also use the left hand. I guess I just didn't notice since I was already using the mouse right-handed well before I finished becoming a proper employed adult.

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#62
My ideal smart watch doesn't exist yet, and I don't think it will for quite some time.

I want a watch that has a few minimal buttons, bluetooth, a vibrate notifer, and no screen. Outwardly, it would appear to look like any other watch. Heck, maybe it could even look good!

I realize that the convenience of being able to see a notification without having to pull the phone out is nice, but I would much rather simply not miss any notifications. There's so much more you could pack into a wristwatch if you didn't have to worry about the screen, and still get tons of value out of it. With context-aware buttons, you could still control your music, remotely activate your phone camera, and all that other fun stuff.

I say start with a watch first, then see what you can fit in with that.

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#63
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, it was not my intention to ask for upvotes for any other reason than to address the quirk in the polling system: voting for an option does not automatically upvote the poll. Sorry if the voting ring detector was triggered. If this poll has been killed by a voting ring detector, any chance that it can be unkilled?

Oh, that's ok. But I wouldn't call this a quirk—it's by design. Voting for an option is how you answer the poll question. Voting for the poll itself says that you think it's an interesting story for HN. Those are different.

This poll no longer appears on the front page, or even the first 3 pages. Any chance this can be fixed so new readers can discover it and weigh in with their opinion?

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#64
post #32

There's lots of reasons why I stopped wearing a watch (mostly due to comfort) and I have almost no desire to return to wearing one. Even before smartphones replaced watches for most people, I usually didn't wear one or sported an old fashioned pocket watch because it was more comfortable. The burden of pulling my phone out of my pocket is not so great that the tradeoff of using an expensive, clumsy, short battery-lif…

I think regular phones replaces watches for most people.

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#65

If they made a smart watch that could do time/calendar, phone calls, text messages, emails, and turn-by-turn navigation - all without requiring tethering to a smartphone - I would buy one and probably not even have a smartphone. I know I'm an anomaly, but I only use my phone to remain contactable and for GPS navigation until I get back to my desktop. A smartphone that didn't have to tether would suit me well, but the…

I think something like that would have to be relatively massive in order to be functional enough to ditch your phone, though

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#67
I have an LG G Watch. It's a useless piece of shit (apologies for the harsh language).

I think this is the biggest non-product I have ever owned. The first major flaw in it is that it wants to be talked to, all the time. You can use the clunky navigation (swiping) to get into a menu but the first 8 or so items are just versions of speech actions. All the way at the bottom you can get into the "apps". The only useful app I was able to use was the pedometer (pee-doh-meter), counting your steps but since it's been put back in it's box, that's useless too.

The size of thing is huge. I'm not a small guy but it's like logging a brick around attached to your wrist. It's battery life is about 6 to 7 hours so you can't actually wear it for a full days work. You would have to recharge is (it's way they're pushing the separately available chargers).

It's tethered to your Android device through bluetooth. If this is the case then why haven't they made the main UI the phone itself rather then me having to awkwardly swipe a tiny little screen? The app that runs on your Android device is another piece of crap. You'd expect you have a whole range of customizations for your watch, right? Nope. You can change background and the clock type. How innovative.

Sorry for the rant guys. I think that anyone who wants to buy one of these things should be warned and really know what you're doing. Don't be silly like me.

Re: Poll: Do you want a smart watch?

#70
I will get the iWatch or the Android ones .. cannot wait until it is in my fingers ... or better around my arm ,) i looked here http://jmp2.in/getasmartwatch for the one i like most. The Pebble, Qualcomm Toq, Galaxy Gear, Sony Smartwatch 2, MetaWatch, an iWatch .. which one will make the run lets see the poll
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